C Court wrote:dagger wrote:C Court wrote:Laws relating to resale tickets needs to change. Right now, sports teams are incentivized to ensure the resale market is active.
They make money on the initial ticket sale and then they take a cut on every resale through Ticketmaster.
I don't give a rat's rear about the resale premium if they put a first class product on the court/field. Everyone was whining about the cost of the Jays' tickets until the team took a big U-Turn last season. As soon as they start exceeding expectations, people go silent (except for WS tickets, but even that was supply and demand and why shouldn't season ticket holders who supported crappy teams from 2017 through 2024 get a break?)
That’s where I disagree with you. Too many season ticket holders only go to a handful of games and then resell the remaining 35+ games at a markup because it’s easy to resell games on Ticketmaster that they don’t want to attend. Those resale tickets are then subject to an unnecessary TM mark-up that hurts the ordinary fan.
If you buy season tickets and attend 25 or 30 games (like I did when I had seasons), then selling a few unused tickets is fine. But reselling 80% - 90% of your tickets is depriving ‘real’ fans of fair access to those seats.
Someone who attends 4-5 games a year (and sells tickets for 35-40 games) isn’t a season ticket holder. They are a ticket broker.
Now, if (like you do) you’re selling tickets privately and not using Ticketmaster, then that’s different because your resell prices don’t carry the additional Ticketmaster gouge. Unfortunately, most season seatholders resell their tickets on Ticketmaster with the additional price gouge and are looking to turn a tidy profit. One of the season ticket holders I buy from hasn’t been to a Raptors game since before Covid when he moved to a farm outside Guelph.
"Real access" is highly subjective. I have sold more games on Ticketmaster - and most of my games overall to people I don't know - because of some unexpected upheaval in my group. One fellow became a father in November for the first time and decided to opt out for this season only. Another was part of a work force that went on strike for a month so he took an unexpected income hit that made going to games financially unwise. I hope he returns next season. I have sold some games on Ticketmaster at a profit, some at a loss. For example, as per the ticket thread, want a deal? Next Monday's pair is available for $150 for my prime upper bowl seats, and that is well below my cost and pretty accessible to people making a Toronto income.
There are a fair number of games when you can go on Ticketmaster fairly last minute and get deals well below the seller's cost. Sure, your Guelph example is not totally unheard-of, I go to fewer games than ever, partly because the experience for me isn't measuring up to the standard of the late 2010s leading up to the title and partly because I'm now at an age where I don't feel comfortable sitting in a crowd of 18,000 people during the height of Covid/flu season, which is why I hold a few games for March/April and the possibility of playoffs. Buying directly from me is a great deal, but a lot of people pushed on to Ticketmaster selling are dealing with the reality that the spectacle isn't compelling enough to commit to it weeks or months ahead, which is how things used to work. My group would divide things up before the home opener. Now, there is more wait and see because who wants to buy a pair for a game solely to see the visiting team's superstar when said star might skip the game (injury, load management, whatever). We almost had such a case with the Lakers' game because Luka was absent, but at least LeBron came to play, and left people with some nice memories of what might prove to be his last game in Toronto. I hang on to my tickets because my seats are so good, and hope that before too much long the home team is compelling, not just occasionally entertaining. More of what happened yesterday, in other words
