Quote:
Originally Posted by simplicitus
Interesting. This thread would do well in oot. What was your biggest loss on in the last few years? Other than Gaga any great concert scores? Do you do better with concerts, events, or sports on a per ticket basis and is volume comparable?
Seems like you could do well figuring which artists are going to be hot and sell "above" their venue (though others will be trying to as well). May even be able to develop some sort of algorithm for this based on, say, style of music, age of avg fan, album and/or single sales, history of venue, etc..
My biggest loss ever was in January for the Saints-Vikings NFC Championship game.
A big part of my (and most other brokers') business is "selling short". When a team clinches a playoff spot, I will sell tickets in the worst nosebleed sections in the highest rows, for day-of-game will call pickup at the venue. I am betting that the prices will be at their highest in the couple hours after a clinch, because that's when most bandwagon fans will hop online to find playoff tickets. 90% of the time (or more), prices the day before or on gameday will come down significantly due to releases from the box office of held-back inventory, and also because ticket-holders see the very high prices and decide to cash in and watch the game on TV.
The night the Saints won the 2nd round playoff game, I sold about 20 pairs of nosebleed and lower level end zone tickets for the NFC champ game at $325 ea and $550 ea respectively. I got into New Orleans on the Friday before the game to pick up tickets (fill my orders). Well...prices did not come down, in fact they heated up into one of the toughest tickets I've ever seen. 2 hours before kickoff I was paying $500 ea or more for nosebleeds to fill my orders. With my travel expenses plus losses I lost well over $8,000 that week. A LOT of people got shut out of that game outside the Superdome holding their fingers in the air looking for tix.
My biggest score last year was Lady Gaga in St Louis. She played at the Fox Theatre, which had about 3,000 seats. $70 tix were going easily for $350-450 each. I hit the onsale pretty hard, and with releases in the final week I cleared about $5,000 on that show.