Are Ticketers Getting Greedy?

Using Neil Diamond’s last summer New York Madison Square dates as an example, the Wall Street Journal recently pointed to the scalper-like practice known as ticket reselling. Under this scenario, done with the approval and full knowledge of the artist and manager involved, a limited number of the best seats are withheld from normal sale channels and immediately offered on sites such as www.ticketexchange.com, owned by Ticketmaster. The purpose of these premium ticket sites which represent the seats offered as being re-sales by fans, is to reap larger profits which are then often shared, according to the article, with artists and promoters. Sometimes the added revenues can top $2 million on a major tour.

A Britney Spears concert in Pittsburgh offered seats for $39.50 to $125 on Ticketmaster.com, but a link saying “Browse premium seats plus tickets posted by fans” was offering the same classes of seats for as high as $1,188.60 each. According to the article the Spears camp refused to comment when asked by WSJ for an explanation, but soon afterwards, the wording “tickets posted by fans” was removed from the TicketExchange Marketplace website and prices were reduced. Bruce Springsteen recently made headlines by criticizing Ticketmaster for a practice similar to this involving tickets to his shows that was done without his permission.