There are risks to waiting, of course — most obviously, that you’ll be shut out. You shouldn’t assume that ticket sales in big city markets with higher demand will behave the same as smaller markets. But, for instance, on Thursday morning tickets were plentiful on Ticketmaster for that night’s Springsteen show at the Ball Arena in Denver, including $160 before fees on upper levels (less if you sat behind the stage) and $1,150 for the coveted “pit” area in front of the stage. On the resale site StubHub, upper-level seats were as low as $135 plus fees, and at least one pit ticket was available for $764.
More Springsteen shows were recently announced for late summer and fall, and prices for some tickets appear to have moderated. Late last month, according to NJ.com, tickets to see Mr. Springsteen in New Jersey this fall were available on Ticketmaster for $59.
Still, waiting simply isn’t workable for fans who must travel to a concert, said John Breyault, a vice president with the National Consumers League, an advocacy group that supports efforts to break up Ticketmaster and its parent company, Live Nation Entertainment. If you delay until just before a show, ticket prices may have fallen, but airfares are likely to be higher and hotel rooms may be scarce.
Rafi Mohammed, a pricing expert who says he has seen Bruce Springsteen in concert about 40 times, wrote in Harvard Business Review that the star’s “energetic performances have yielded the greatest dollar-for-dollar value in concert history.” You can decide if you agree.
Here are some questions and answers about concert ticketing:
Can performers and ticket sellers ban resale tickets?
The rising star Zach Bryan aims to do that with his current tour. Working mostly with the ticket seller AXS, Mr. Bryan has said he is keeping prices at $156 per ticket and setting a “no transfer” policy to avoid inflated prices through the resale market. Ticket holders can generally resell for face value through the official tour marketplace, but tickets bought through other resale sites won’t be honored at concert venues, according to the tour website. Mr. Breyault, the consumer advocate, says banning resales often fails because ticket brokers still find ways to hawk the tickets. They may arrange, for instance, to meet the buyer at the event to scan digital tickets. And some states have laws that ban restrictions on resales.
Are there proposals to regulate ticket sales?
Ticketmaster’s botched Taylor Swift sale led to Senate hearings and a proposal by President Biden to limit or better disclose ticketing fees and to require disclosure of so-called holdbacks that shrink the supply of tickets available to the general public.
Tour organizers, Mr. Breyault said, often hold back large blocks of tickets from initial sales for the benefit of groups like fan club members, credit card loyalty program participants and friends of the band. They release any leftovers later. If shoppers had better information about the number of tickets available to the general public, he said, they could at least make informed guesses about their chances of buying tickets during the initial sale and whether it was worth their time to try.
Source: | This article originally belongs to Nytimes.com
