The Ticketmaster-Live Nation merger is less than a month old and the newly combined company is already raising ticket prices.
Ticketsnow, the secondary ticket market subsidiary of Ticketmaster, announced today that they will be increasing service charges on buyers to an astounding 18.5% post transaction!
As a point of reference, the average price of a ticket sold on Stubhub in 2008 was $133. Assuming prices increased about 5-10% over the past two years we can say that the current average ticket price on Ticketsnow is about $150. And since most people buy a pair of tickets, a transaction on Ticketsnow could run you about $300. Tack on that 18.5% service fee and that’s an extra $55! At SaveFans!we only charge $5. Do Ticketmaster and Live Nation really need this additional $50? I thought this newly merged company was supposed to LOWER the cost of tickets???
- Ticketmaster and TicketsNow have been using websites masquerading as affiliates of venues, promoters, teams, and artists to trick the public into paying OVER face value for tickets thinking they were getting them FOR face value direct from the source. Full Story»
- During an on sale for Bruce Springsteen tickets last year Ticketmaster claimed they had a site malfunction and redirected buyers to Ticketsnow where tickets were offered for prices higher than face value. Curiously Ticketmaster was informing these buyers that the show was sold out when it was not.Full Story»
A few weeks back we told fans about TicketDisaster.org, a website urging ticket buying consumers to sign a petition blocking the proposed Ticketmaster-Live Nation merger. Well it seems like TicketDisaster is not the only organization opposed to the deal which will in effect give one company control over all aspects of the live events industry.
And guess how Ticketmaster and Live Nation deal with opposition??? Pay them off!
TM-LN are so desperate to push their merger through congress that Live Nation has reportedly offered to sell some of their venues for BELOW MARKET VALUE to Anschultz Entertainment Group (AEG). This is in response to AEG CEO and president Tim Leiweke calling the merger “troubling” and “not good for the industry.”
As a condition of selling these marked down venues Ticketmaster and Live Nation are asking AEG to drop their opposition to the merger. Isn’t this called corporate bribery?
As if this story isn’t troubling enough here are some other things you should know about Ticketmaster business practices that could only get worse if the merger goes through:
- Ticketmaster and TicketsNow have been using websites masquerading as affiliates of venues, promoters, teams, and artists to trick the public into paying OVER face value for tickets thinking they were getting them FOR face value direct from the source. Full Story»
- Ticketmaster secretly sells tickets on behalf of artists for over face value through their “official platinum seats” program on Ticketexchange.Full Story»(plus screen shot proof)
- Ticketmaster secretly offered over $1.5 million worth of Britney Spears tickets on Ticketmaster.com and Ticketmaster.ca through this Ticketexchange program. The price Ticketmaster listed for her show in Las Vegas was as high as $2,698.44 per ticket!!!!!!Full Story»(plus screen shot proof)
- During an on sale for Bruce Springsteen tickets last year Ticketmaster claimed they had a site malfunction and redirected buyers to Ticketsnow where tickets were offered for prices higher than face value. Curiously Ticketmaster was informing these buyers that the show was sold out when it was not.Full Story»
One can only imagine what post-merger Ticketmaster, Live Nation, and TicketsNow is capable of…
It is our job here at SaveFans! to educate you, the fans, to what is going on in the world of tickets. There is currently no bigger story that directly affects how you have access to future live events than the proposed merger between ticketing giants, Ticketmaster and Live Nation. The possible creation of a new TM LN monopoly could severely restrict your consumer rights, raise ticket prices, squelch innovation and competition, and result in a poor buying experience and lackluster customer service.
In the wake of the merger’s review by Congress a new website has launched, TicketDisaster.org, created by the NATB (National Association of Ticket Brokers) and the National Consumer League. The site implores fans to call on the Department of Justice to stop the Ticketmaster / LiveNation merger.
We at SaveFans! strongly suggest taking the time to visit TicketDisaster.org and keeping up to date on this monumental decision for the live events industry. It is time for fans to stand up and have a say against corporate giants like Ticketmaster and Live Nation!
Here are some important facts from TicketDisaster.org on how the merger could impact you:
“Ticketmaster and Live Nation dominate the live entertainment industry and any further integration will allow the new company unprecedented control over pricing and access, thereby relinquishing consumer purchasing power.
Ticketmaster currently owns an artist-management business, Front Line Management Group, which contracts with roughly 200 artists. Live Nation owns or has exclusive deals with 139 venues, but it also manages about 150 artists. This merger would allow the merged entity to determine the prices of access to venues, concert promotion, ticketing, and other services – permitting a single firm to dominate virtually all aspects of the live event market in most cities across the country.
Ticketmaster uses multiple means to take advantage of consumers and increase the price of tickets and services, a practice that will grow with increased control over the market.
Unfortunately for the fans, as Ticketmaster’s empire grows, so do its fees. As the New Yorker puts it, “Ticketmaster is the empire that service fees built: Over the last five years it has generated more than $5 billion in ‘convenience fees,’ ‘order-processing fees’ and newer schemes like charging fans $2.50 to print their own tickets.” These fees are exorbitant and “often account for more than thirty percent of the cost of a ticket.”
A Ticketmaster/Live Nation merger will guarantee the new company full and exclusive access to competitively sensitive live entertainment information.
The proposed monopoly will also align previously competing interests, thereby allowing them to deliver key competitive information to keep prices (including access to venue, promotions, and ticket sales) at a premium. The merger will enable the merged firm to know the most competitively sensitive information about its rivals, making it more difficult for existing companies to survive and for new companies to enter the market. Eliminating competition will simply allow more room to drive up prices for consumers.
Ticketmaster has a track record of initiating anti-competitive practices to block competitors from accessing their events.
Through the use of paperless ticketing (requiring identification and financial information for entrance to events) and the act of voiding bar codes of previously purchased tickets, Ticketmaster has already inconvenienced fans and attempted to block any ability for them to buy, sell, or otherwise transfer their tickets in an open marketplace and for a competitive price.”
Engaging YOU THE FANS is priority #1 at SaveFans! We want to make your ticket purchase not only easy but fun. Bookmark our blog for humorous videos, relevant ticket news, and up to the minute schedules and tour dates for your favorite teams and artists.
At SaveFans.com we are saving fans one ticket at a time!
Las Vegas baby! SaveFans! CEO Wes Brodsky, CTO Joel Brass, and Sr. Developer Shen Deshayne will be among the 500 attendees at the Ticket Summit conference and trade show this week. This annual event will bring together the secondary ticketing industry’s elite to discuss topics that effect you, the ticket buying public. Among those in attendance (other than SaveFans!) will be representatives from Stubhub, the New Jersey Nets, Ticketmaster, Sony BMG, New York Daily News, the NBA, the NFL, the NHL, NBC Universal, Live Nation, Reuters, The Cincinnati Reds, Nokia, and many others. To learn more please check out the Ticket Summit Official Website.
Look who’s in the news AGAIN? Wouldn’t you know its the darkest dynamic duo in the world of tickets… Ticketmaster and TicketsNow.
In the latest episode of Ticket Wars the Illinois Attorney General office has uncovered a dastardly plot by Ticketmaster to defraud consumers. The evil geniuses at Ticketmaster and TicketsNow have been using websites masquerading as affiliates of venues, promoters, teams, and artists to trick the public into paying OVER face value for tickets thinking they were getting them FOR face value direct from the source. Over 100 websites have since been shut down and TicketsNow has been ordered to pay $50k for consumer fraud enforcement and education.
It appears as if these guys hide behind more masks than Darth Vader and The Green Goblin combined. And just like in comic books our newest villain TicketMASKer just wont go away. Luckily we are here to serve and protect. So until next time fans… Same SaveFans! time, same SaveFans! blog.
Well wouldn’t you know Ticketmaster is scalping tickets for the pop princess herself, Britney Spears! We crunched the numbers and here are the results. A total of 15 shows are currently on sale on Ticketmaster.com and Ticketmaster.ca for Britney’s Circus tour. As of Saturday, June 20th at 5pm pst, Ticketexchange was offering a total of 5690 tickets for a whopping $1,478,550.64 (Ticketmaster is also holding high bid wins auctions and VIP seats which makes this number even higher). Here is a breakdown per show:
As if this isn’t disgusting enough, Ticketmaster is actually retailing a pair of tickets to the Las Vegas show at Mandalay Bay Resort on September 6th for $2,698.44 per ticket!!!!!!
So how do we know that Ticketmaster is responsible for these seats? Well we were lucky enough to catch a glitch on Ticketmaster’s part that placed the Ticketexchange seats on sale BEFORE the show even went on sale to the public! And since you need to register a bank account and input the bar codes from the tickets to list tickets for sale on Ticketexchange it is literally impossible that these seats could have come from anyone but a Ticketmaster insider. Here is a screen shot taken on June 19th at 3am (the show wasn’t on sale until 10am).
SaveFans! is here to “save fans” from this corporate B.S. We will continue to let you, the ticket buying public, know whats really going on out there and we will always let you pay what you want at SaveFans.com!
As I’m sure many of you know the recent Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band shows at the Izod Center caused quite a big ticket controversy. At the center of this controversy was Ticketmaster’s handling of these sold out shows, redirecting unknowing buyers to Ticketsnow where they could purchase tickets for over face value (I guess this is better than them secretly selling tickets on TicketExchange – but that’s a whole different blog post).
Well a recent report based on data from the Open Public Records Act shows an even more compelling story. Apparently The Boss himself is responsible for a large quantity of tickets that were held back from the ticket buying public. According to this data 2262 tickets were withheld from fans with 1018 out of 1126 best tickets (the four closest sections to the stage) not being available during the public sale.).
Where did these tickets go? You got it… Bruce’s band, agent, family, record label, and New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority! And guess what? This is ILLEGAL. NJ state law allows for an artist to withhold a maximum 5% of an arena for family, record labels, fan clubs etc. Bruce’s camp scooped up a whopping 12% of the building. And to top it off not one of these tickets were located in the upper deck, only the very best for Springsteen and his posse.).
So it appears as if Bruce Springsteen doesn’t want his real fans anywhere near the stage. And obviously Ticketmaster wants them to buy tickets for the maximum possible price on Ticketsnow and TicketExchange. The solution? Just go to SaveFans! and pay what YOU want for tickets!
If you want a better view than this try trading tickets with Bruce’s uncle. He is sitting in one of the 1,018 floor seats not released by Ticketmaster.
It seems like the folks at Ticketmaster are a little confused about fair play and consumer rights. Case and point – the new “paperless tickets” Ticketmaster is requiring for the upcoming Miley Cyrus tour.
This new feature requires concertgoers to buy tickets from Ticketmaster.com and Ticketmaster.ca with a credit card, then use the credit card along with photo id at the gate to get in. You got that right, you and 18,000+ fans will have to wait in line while each and every credit card is scanned at the door. If you get sick or have a change of plans you cannot transfer your ticket, and for all you soccer moms, you will have to pay for parking and walk your teenage daughter all the way to the entrance for her and her friends to get in (who will be embarrassed to be standing next to you at the hottest event of the year).
Now the funny part in this sad mess is the alleged reason for implementing the paperless ticket policy. Here is the direct quote from the Miley Cyrus tour page on Ticketmaster.
“Why? To ensure fans get fair access to seats at face value-the only way to get into the event is with the credit card used to purchase the tickets.”
Well I hope the CEO of Ticketmaster Irving Azoff doesn’t have a daughter and if he does I hope she’s not a Miley Cyrus fan because Ticketmaster has been selling tickets for over face value for years!
Ticketmaster has been retailing tickets through “high bid win” type auctions on Ticketmaster.com and Ticketmaster.ca since 2003. Coincidentally enough Ticketmaster actually offered these auctions for the Hannah Montana Miley Cyrus “Best of Both Worlds Tour” in 2007 with seats for the Oracle Arena show on Nov 1st selling for over $2,000! Wow talk about ensuring “fair access to seats at face value”!
It gets even better… Currently you can buy a Miley Cyrus “VIP package” at iloveallaccess.com (owned by Ticketmaster of course) for $295 per ticket (face value is $79.50). Now there are amazing amenities included in this package such as a tour laminate (which doesn’t include backstage access) a pre-show party (which Miley Cyrus will not attend) and “hassle free” shopping (so you can more conveniently spend $75 on a t-shirt). And get this, these wonderful features are subject to change without notice. Since I can go to Kinkos and make a laminate for $5 and I’d rather wait in the paperless ticketing line outside the venue than attend a preshow party with no appearance from Miley Cyrus. I think I can pretty confidently say I would be paying $295 for the guaranteed first 25 row ticket to the show. An honest person might call this paying above face value for a premium seat.
The icing on the cake is Ticketmaster spent $250 million to acquire TicketsNow, a leading secondary ticketing site that sells tickets for over face value! We won’t even get into recent litigation that alleges Ticketmaster redirected potential Bruce Springsteen ticket buyers to TicketsNow and confused them into paying over face value for tickets.
To make things worse Ticketmaster has built TicketExchange, a marketplace that allows fans in the U.S. and Canada to buy and sell tickets directly on Ticketmaster.com and Ticketmaster.ca. Well wouldn’t you know that a vast majority of these tickets are being offered by Ticketmaster for… what do you know… over face value! They now call them “official platinum seats” and proclaim
“the goal is to give the most passionate fans fair and safe access to the best tickets, while enabling artists and other people involved in staging live events to price tickets closer to their true value.”
Seems to contradict their paperless ticket policy quote, cited earlier…
For over a year now Ticketmaster has been selling tickets on TicketExchange for over face value for some of the biggest artists in the biz. Elton John & Billy Joel, Neil Diamond, Van Halen, Tina Turner, Celine Dion, New Kids on the Block, Steely Dan, The Eagles (just to name a few).
I know the world in 2009 is a confusing place. But I mean, c’mon Ticketmaster… Are you going to restrict consumer rights with a “paperless tickets” policy that attempts to ensure tickets are available for face value, OR are you going to sell tickets over face value on your TicketExchange and TicketsNow subsidiaries? Just pick a side and stick with it!
Too Bad Ticketmaster Makes it such a Hassle to see Miley…
In case you haven’t heard people, Michael Jackson fans are protesting the postponement of his concerts at the O2 Dome in London. You may recall that he narrowly avoided having his possessions auctioned off last month, but I digress…
Apparently Jacko / The King of Pop has delayed his residency in London, which means his first concert will be postponed! People are obviously pissed since they spent good money on travel expenses and event tickets. Sounds like AEG might become the next Ticketmaster in the court of public opinion There are also rumors that Jackson is suffering from Skin Cancer – not confirmation on that…
SaveFans.com is the official website and online marketplace of SaveFans! connecting ticket buyers looking to negotiate the price they pay with ticket sellers. SaveFans! is not affiliated with Ebay, Craigslist, Ticketmaster, Tickets.com, Stubhub, any other ticketing company or ticket broker, box office, or venue, or sports organization such as NFL, NBA, MLB, NHL, NCAA, PGA, NASCAR, WNBA, WWE, UFC, CFL, USTA. Asking prices listed on this site are dynamic and reflect real market conditions such as sold out games, high demand and low demand events, premium seating (ie front row, floor seats, lower level seats, luxury suites) or get in type seating (ie upper level seats, roof seats, standing room, general admission), weather, all star players, playoffs and championship series, and thus may be more expensive or cheaper than the face value printed on the ticket. All trademarked or copyright logos, names, and images that appear on this page are used for factual descriptive purposes only.
The Ticketmaster-Live Nation merger is less than a month old and the newly combined company is already raising ticket prices.
A few weeks back we told fans about 
It is our job here at 
THE POWER TO NEGOTIATE! Where else can YOU negotiate the price you pay for your favorite sports, concert, and theater tickets online???
Las Vegas baby! 
Look who’s in the news AGAIN? Wouldn’t you know its the darkest dynamic duo in the world of tickets… Ticketmaster and TicketsNow.
It seems like the folks at Ticketmaster are a little confused about fair play and consumer rights. Case and point – the new “paperless tickets” Ticketmaster is requiring for the upcoming Miley Cyrus tour.
It gets even better… Currently you can buy a Miley Cyrus “VIP package” at iloveallaccess.com (owned by Ticketmaster of course) for $295 per ticket (face value is $79.50). Now there are amazing amenities included in this package such as a tour laminate (which doesn’t include backstage access) a pre-show party (which Miley Cyrus will not attend) and “hassle free” shopping (so you can more conveniently spend $75 on a t-shirt). And get this, these wonderful features are subject to change without notice. Since I can go to Kinkos and make a laminate for $5 and I’d rather wait in the paperless ticketing line outside the venue than attend a preshow party with no appearance from Miley Cyrus. I think I can pretty confidently say I would be paying $295 for the guaranteed first 25 row ticket to the show. An honest person might call this paying above face value for a premium seat.
There are also rumors that Jackson is suffering from Skin Cancer – not confirmation on that…
