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Nobody likes paying $7, $8, sometimes $12, in concert ticket service charges, so the possibility that Live Nation will decrease those fees sounds like a good thing. But, as reported by the Los Angeles Times, as service fees go down, the base price of concert tickets is likely to go up.
The Live Nation conference call Yahoo! posted on Monday indicates the company is interested in utilizing “dynamic pricing” tactics to make up for the revenue losses they have faced since merging with Ticketmaster at the beginning of the year.
During the conference call, Live Nation Entertainment Chief Executive Michael Rapino said the company’s goal is to focus more on “the face value of tickets” to make up for this past quarter’s three percent drop in concert attendance. “So, whether it’s seat maps, dynamic pricing or just convincing the band that the front row is worth $400, not $100, we’re noticing a great reception by artists worldwide who would like to capture more of the upside, and our first goal is to figure out how to price the house right,” Rapino said.
Those in favor of upping the base price of tickets say that StubHub and other ticket re-sell site’s prices are significantly higher from the get-go, so Live Nation should be taking advantage of the higher prices consumers are willing to pay.
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What a brilliant idea. Concert attendance is decrease so let's increase the price of tickets. That will surely make attendance rise.
That said, i'd much rather pay $50 for a concert ticket than $40 with $10 service fees. Either way, I think we're going to end up paying more than ever before.
Complete and utter BS. If I can, I'm gonna start going to the box office more often.
I hope in the future, new artists can find ways to completely avoid using Ticketmaster and Livenation altogether. Maybe popularize venues that don't depend on them for revenue or something (if such a place exists).
Such places do exist.
After the Ticketmaster and Live Nation merger, the 9:30 Club in Washington, D.C. and Merriweather Post Pavilion in Maryland stopped using Tickets.com as their ticket service and switched to Ticketfly to avoid both selling tickets through their competitor and charging ridiculous service fees.
If only more venues would join in the fight against the Live Nation behemoth.
http://tinyurl.com/38qzzbk
Yeah you would think if you went to the box office you would avoid the service fees...but at least here in Cleveland they still charge a $5 fee at the box office of our Live Nation venues as a "convenience charge" It's all ridiculous.