Oct 18, 2007 10:30 pm US/Central
Good Question: How Do Tickets Sell Out So Fast?
(WCCO)
If you have kids, especially little girls, you probably know the name Hannah Montana. She's the singing star of a popular Disney Channel show and musical act that is selling tickets on par with the Rolling Stones.
This Sunday's show in Minneapolis sold out in minutes, leaving many parents wondering how that happens.
"She loves Hannah Montana. All the songs, she knows," said Jill Zimmer, who planned on taking her daughter and son to see this weekend's show at the Target Center. The day the tickets went on sale online she was on time. "I literally sat and watched the clock. At Noon I tried and tried and tried 50 times if not 100 times."
Every ticket was gone in about five minutes, leaving Jill empty-handed.
"I was just shocked," said Zimmer.
"I think it took everybody by surprise," said Brian Obert, a ticket broker in Minneapolis.
So how do ticket sales for concerts and big sporting events work?
"Primarily most of the tickets get sold on Ticketmaster's Web site," said Obert.
The show's promoter or the venue makes a deal with Ticketmaster to sell tickets to the general public.
The problem is that the "general public" includes professional ticket buyers who stand in line, use multiple phone lines as well as dozens if not hundreds of computers to grab as many tickets as they can. That's why shows sell out so fast. These ticket buyers then sell their tickets to ticket brokers for a profit.
"If we're paying the most for them, they'll sell them to us," said Obert, who runs the Ticket King outlet in Minneapolis. "If we're not they'll sell them to someone else."
Ticket brokers then sell the tickets to us for whatever the market bears.
"If someone is willing to pay a certain amount, that's what dictates the price," said Obert.
Seats for Hannah Montana are selling for hundreds of dollars. Someone paid $2,600 for four front-row seats.
"It would cost me a house payment," said Zimmer about the tickets available at this point. She decided to pass. Even the brokers say they want the Hannah Montana show to come and go because it's giving their line of work a bad name.
"It doesn't seem like anybody ends up being that happy," said Obert.
Another way these ticket buyers get so many tickets is with software that allows them to flood the Ticketmaster Web site with requests.
Ticketmaster is suing the companies who make and use that software. Ticket King is not involved in that lawsuit and says they do not use any such software to get their tickets.
(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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