(Follow-up) It's kinda exhausting reading here through comment after comment of armchair "entertainment venue economists" imagining how to maximize the profits for a single event, all the while forgetting the circumstances leading to event tickets being underpriced.
Circumstances such as the fact events are generally a part of tours, that the artists likely want a diverse audience, that event sales have side effects on future sales and marketing, etc etc.
Not specifically targeted at you, krn, but is it really so far-fetched to think that artists did think about the fact they'd still have sold out venues at a higher price point?
> [...] imagining how to maximize the profits for a single event
No, I am not interested in maximizing profits. I am only interested in eliminating resellers.
> Circumstances such as the fact events are generally a part of tours, that the artists likely want a diverse audience, that event sales have side effects on future sales and marketing, etc etc.
That's exactly my point: if currently tickets are grabbed by automated systems and resold for much higher prices, none of these goals are reached by the artists.
Your answer is to become the reseller and charge more putting the reseller out of business?
Now you have increased profits short term and increased risks. And only rich fans can attend. This works for some stars and against other star'a brand.
A popular answer is requiring the purchaser to show id to get in with obvious drawbacks.
Rising prices would lose the cool fans and make the followers who can afford less likely to want to go.
> Your answer is to become the reseller and charge more putting the reseller out of business?
No, that's what the promoter should do.
> Now you have increased profits short term and increased risks. And only rich fans can attend. This works for some stars and against other star'a brand.
No, it's doesn't have to be this way. Price could start at $1000, but the minimum could be as low as $50.
Yes, the rich fans would get their tickets first, but after the first 50% tickets are sold, all the remaining tickets could cost $50.
This way, at least theoretically, all the rich fans would get their tickets directly, and the resellers would go out of business.
What makes you think there would be any remaining tickets? I mean I don’t see how this system could increase the availability, it would only allow the event organizers to get all the surplus that goes to the resellers now. Also having a fair and transparent system would likely only increase the number of bidders driving up the price even more.
> What makes you think there would be any remaining tickets?
Again, there could be a rule, that after the first 30-50% tickets are sold, all the remaining tickets are sold at the base price (let's say, $50).
It's just a trick to force resellers out of business: because there is a limited number of people who can afford to buy tickets at heavily inflated prices.
Under your model, the first 30-50 percent of tickets would be sold at a high price, and the last 50 percent would be grabbed by resellers then ... all this has done is increase the average price of the tickets, and resellers still exist.
