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Secondary Ticketing Sites


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46 minutes ago, Hugh Jass said:

I actually miss the days when you could buy and sell tickets on eBay, used to pick up tickets ridiculously cheaply a day or two before the gig (paid a fiver for a pair of Oasis tickets once).

Yep, their move over to Stubhub removed the vast majority of bargains. There are still some out there, but even when the ticket price is below face then the transaction fees bump it right up.

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3 minutes ago, briddj said:

as See Tickets are showing (finally)

I wouldn't place too much store in that. They launched a Viagogo-type site a number of years ago, too (tho I think they've killed it off now).

I see these things as attempts to undermine others who are doing similar, to help protect their position in the primary/first-sale marketplace, rather than as a platform that they want to take off in the way it's presented.

After all, if their concern was really about a platform for face value resales, they could simply direct people to one of those other already-existing platforms.

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1 hour ago, eFestivals said:

because if punters are going to be dis-allowed to profit via a restrictive law, then punters shouldn't be forced to lose out via a restrictive law.

It's about balance.

Football is different. The restrictions were put on footie ticket trades for different reasons to anything about profit.

And the cinema is different. No one is proposing laws to restrict trades in cinema tickets, and anyway there's no physical restriction on capacity via a film's non-availability (as there is for a band, where their existence as a physical individual limits availability). The free market can operate freely.

If you like, it's the difference between a normal product where supply can be increased to satisfy demand - standard free market rules - and land where that cannot be done and so shouldn't be treated by the same 'free market' rules (particularly as we all need land to live). If that confuses you, I suggest a good read about land reform that's happened in every country in the world ... apart from the UK (so we tend to have a mental block around it).

Because at the moment they can sell their ticket perhaps for a profit via the standard rules of society (free market, essentially).

That right of freedom (in what's being advocated) is going to be removed, and at a personal cost to those who can no longer off-set the loss on one ticket via the profit on another. Balance!

Care to tell me how popular govt legislation is which in-effect says "we're going to force you to be a loser, which you weren't forced to be before"?

You might regard that as politicians covering their own arses over legislation that would undoubtedly be unpopular with the people who'd then be losing out, but actually, that idea of creating a fair balance within restrictive legislation is actually a very standard attitude towards legislation on its own merits.

I agree that the legislation would mean that someone whose plans change would be 'forced to be the loser'.

However, the current state of play forces thousands of music fans to the loser at just about every major music event in the country.

As I stated in my earlier post, we can talk all day about a genuine fan who cannot make the show anymore but the reality is the real problem of touts buying hundreds of tickets for the sole reason of trying to sell for profit.

People can pretend all they like, but if tickets appear at vastly inflated prices at 9.01am on ticket day, you can guarantee it's not someone who bought a ticket before realising a minute later that they are working on the day of the concert.

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Just now, eFestivals said:

I wouldn't place too much store in that. They launched a Viagogo-type site a number of years ago, too (tho I think they've killed it off now).

I see these things as attempts to undermine others who are doing similar, to help protect their position in the primary/first-sale marketplace, rather than as a platform that they want to take off in the way it's presented.

After all, if their concern was really about a platform for face value resales, they could simply direct people to one of those other already-existing platforms.

I remember their "Viagogo" - it seemed to last about five minutes. As though someone higher up the food chain found out about it and told them to stop it immediately.

I'd agree there is partly a "fear" factor about it. But they get to take the booking fee on a ticket twice, which is where their profit is.

All this, of course, doesn't change the fact that hardly any unwanted tickets for popular events will be sold back on See Tickets when people can sell them for much more on the resale sites.

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4 minutes ago, rivalschools.price said:

However, the current state of play forces thousands of music fans to the loser at just about every major music event in the country.

Nope. No one is forcing anyone to pay over the odds.

The best way to beat the touts is never ever deal with them. Then they're fucked.

The very people who complain about them are very-often the same people who enable them.

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2 minutes ago, briddj said:

I remember their "Viagogo" - it seemed to last about five minutes. As though someone higher up the food chain found out about it and told them to stop it immediately.

I think it just never took off.

And I don't think they really expected it to, my take on it was that it was there to try to spoil the market for the other platforms doing the same.

 

2 minutes ago, briddj said:

I'd agree there is partly a "fear" factor about it. But they get to take the booking fee on a ticket twice, which is where their profit is.

Few people in business do stuff that they don't hope might pay for itself, but that doesn't get to mean that's it's real purpose.

There's already a number of different fan-to-fan face-value platforms. Creating a new one only makes those other ones and the whole fan-to-fan thing less attractive to bother with for those fans, because sourcing a ticket in that way is more difficult if you have to trawl the many different platforms.

i'd say it's been done as a spoiler, but perhaps I'm wrong.

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Just now, eFestivals said:

There's already a number of different fan-to-fan face-value platforms. Creating a new one only makes those other ones and the whole fan-to-fan thing less attractive to bother with for those fans, because sourcing a ticket in that way is more difficult if you have to trawl the many different platforms.

 

Good point. And where do you know is best to sell your spare ticket if there's loads of places?

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13 minutes ago, eFestivals said:

Nope. No one is forcing anyone to pay over the odds.

The best way to beat the touts is never ever deal with them. Then they're fucked.

The very people who complain about them are very-often the same people who enable them.

Forcing them to pay over the odds if they want to go as there are no available tickets #pedant

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5 minutes ago, briddj said:

Good point. And where do you know is best to sell your spare ticket if there's loads of places?

exactly - tho the platforms are aimed at buyers rather than sellers, really. 

As i say, I regard See's new platform - and the other new ones that are cropping up (there's been a few in the last year who've got in touch with us) - as spoilers even if that's not the intention of the person creating them.

If the face value thing is ever going to work well and have fans buy into it, then it really needs just one platform. As soon as the platforms start to fragment then so with the desire of people to look for tickets on them.

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6 minutes ago, briddj said:

If people were not playing the inflated prices on the tout sites they would soon drop. We all know that is a utopian situation with no base in reality.

there's two sides to this. The touts cannot be blamed without also blaming those who enable them - instead of it being presented as people being "forced" to buy from touts, which is just self-serving bollocks.

"those people over there are bad, they need to be stopped ... but only after I've got my ticket from the bad people cos my needs are what's most important". It's rather pathetic from a real world take. ;)

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Exactly, we've discussed already how secondary ticketing sites have become so commonplace that people believe they are the primary ticket seller, and buy the tickets at an inflated price without realising they are paying more than they should.

Edited by evilduck
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21 minutes ago, evilduck said:

Exactly, we've discussed already how secondary ticketing sites have become so commonplace that people believe they are the primary ticket seller, and buy the tickets at an inflated price without realising they are paying more than they should.

hmmmm .... so now it's not about how 'you' don't want to keep on giving touts your money which ensures they continue touting, but about how 'you' need to protect the people who aren't as smart as you from their own stupidity?

('you' in quotes because that's not written about specifically-you)

The first obvious one is that any stupid people will still be stupid people. It doesn't change anything of that.

And I'm not comfortable with the use - or mis-use - of other people in that way to try and make the case for your own want to stand up. 

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There's another factor within all of this which i've not seem mentioned yet - and that's how the bands choose to limit their supply in the first place to create that over-demand.

They're helping to create the environment for the touts, by wanting the most money for the least work. Rather like those touts, in fact.

I mean, I reckon we'd all quite like 18 months off to do nothing - or a 'hiatus' as it gets called - but most of us can't afford it cos we've spent all our hard earned on tickets from touts. :P

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One thing that keeps getting overlooked is the allocations that are going to these sites that are never going on general sale.

If some bedroom touts want to try it with the handful of tickets they can buy then fair play to them. Sometimes they'll make money sometimes they'll lose.

But I keep noticing bands facebooks and twitters saying on the week of tours that 50/75 standing tickets for X shows going back on sale a few days before. Have a hunch that's viagogo or whoever then returning the tickets from their allocation that they couldn't sell at a stupid price to be sold at the original price. 

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21 minutes ago, ilikesimpsons said:

But I keep noticing bands facebooks and twitters saying on the week of tours that 50/75 standing tickets for X shows going back on sale a few days before. Have a hunch that's viagogo or whoever then returning the tickets from their allocation that they couldn't sell at a stupid price to be sold at the original price. 

Nope, it's almost definitely not that.

For the larger venues there's an area that might be required by the band for the show to happen, but which mostly isn't used - which then becomes available as audience space.

There's also tickets held back for guests, press, etc - because the venue can't be over-filled, whether by punters or friends of the band.

When it's clear what is needed and what isn't, any spares are put back on sale.

Because the profit on shows is made from the last tickets sold (rather than a percentage of each ticket), the last tickets are the pay-day for the promoter. Those are the tickets they make their livelihood from.

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Bit of a strange one this as I only have good experiences from using Viagogo but bad ones from using Twickets. 

I have attempted to sell tickets on Twickets twice but been unable to. Once was a Kendal Calling ticket and the other was a Stone Roses in Dublin ticket. The KC ticket I could not sell as I had not received from See at that point and I could not sell the Roses one as it was not in the UK. Both tickets I listed on Viagogo for less than I paid and both were snapped up immediately.

When buying from Twickets, I was had over with a Parklife ticket. It was listed as Saturday but ended up being a Sunday ticket. When getting no joy out of Twickets or the seller I went through PayPal to get a refund. Suddenly the seller was all apologetic and then the main man at Twickets started emailing me being all apologetic. 

Now say what you want about Viagogo, buy as a buyer you are secure in the knowledge you will get a refund if the ticket is not as advertised. Even though Twickets may say that is the case with them, I found it not to be true.

In regards to extortionate prices charged on Viagogo, I have paid over the odds before for Morrissey tickets. I will not lie here, if I had not managed to get tickets for the upcoming New Order gigs I would have paid what ever it would have cost to get one. Now I know people will say that I am fueling the fire, nut needs must and desperate times call for desperate measures.

Now I am all for government legislation making it illegal for tickets to be sold above face value. Yet I do not see why the promoter should have to issue refunds. You get the option to insure your ticket when you purchase it.

Edited by eastynh
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The other thing I noticed (prehaps I need to start wearing a tin foil hat) was a few years ago when the libertines played 3 nights at aly paly, it didn't sell out for weeks and weeks. Then on the same day all 3 sold out, tons of tickets appeared on the touting sites at inflated prices for a few days, before plummeting to under market value. 

Its like they took the tickets off sale on ticket master so they could bill the shows as "sold out" milked the last bit of cash out of people who were on the fence about going and panicked at seeing it suddenly sold out, before dropping prices to get the last few £££ in.

Im probably just mad, but seems odd 3 shows that didn't sell out fast would all sell out the same day. Convinced they're all crooks and dodgy stuff like this goes on a lot 

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