Getting tickets to real fans

[Wheels]

Okay people, action time. We have a few months to come up with a solution to the ticket nightmare that saw some non-fans end up with 15 tickets to sell while many true fans missed out.

In this thread post ideas for new ways of selling the tickets... serious replies only, this one could make a difference.

[Gatsby]

there should be a members club on his fansite whereby members can order a certain amount of tickets and proof should be shown when they go to pick them up... then the ticket touts couldnt sell them on...

[Jarv]

Serious replies only?!! i didn't agree to that!!


Kidding, but im at a loss--it's a really good idea, but i can't think of anything

[Patricia]

First, you really shouldn't be able to buy more than 2 tickets.

[Sionna]

I'm not sure bout that,I'd say 4 is fair enough.

[Wheels]

I don't know about that Patricia... if you want to bring friends and they can't access the net at the time...

Simon's idea has potential. Isn't that what Radiohead do?

Should it then be linked to seniority of the members if there are not enough to go arround?

[Patricia]

I think 2 is fair, the problem with these Robber Barons is that they can get too many tickets too easily.

[Gatsby]

ok i wrote a serious reply so i get to have a joking reply[img]smileys/smiley2.gif[/img]


what if... we all got tatoo's of damien on our bums so that we could proove we are die hard fans?? [img]smileys/smiley4.gif[/img]

[Sionna]

I already have that,i thought everyone had one of them done?[img]smileys/smiley2.gif[/img]

[Wheels]

Not neccessarily stupid... extract from that the idea of ID cards... the more gigs you go to the more seniority you get in the club. Most senior gets first refusal on tickets...

Maybe expand the club from just the DR site to EskimoFriends and some of the other big fan sites... each gets an allocation.

So we have clubs, ID cards (or at least accounts that track your use of the site and presence at concerts), a way of ranking who gets first call on tickets.

Then maybe an amount sold the traditional way to allow new fans to get to see him.

This isn't shaping up too bad.

[Enoch]

It'sanice idea Wheels but at the end of the day its a free market and nothing is likely to change is it? sad but true methinks.


If the artsists themselves feel the same way about touts then I'd suggest invitation only shows could be a good solution. Then the artists (or their people) get to decide what a "true fan" is.

[DaveG]

okay, i do think that an allocation should be given to fan sites, i really think this is a wonderful suggestion, so then Emmett would be in charge of distribution and knowing that he is not one to be bribed then i'm 100% positive that these tickets would be distributed fairly to the members of eskimofriends.......of course the chances of this happening are really slim, i don't see damien's management or the show's promoters actually going for this as a means of solving the ticketing problem......i do think that tickets should still go on sale to the public, if they want to expand damo's fan base, then they will still have to put a lot of tickets on general sale....as regards tickets to the official site, nah i don't think so, how many people actually use that site anymore, i for one most certainly don't and i'm sure there are many others.......1500 tickets for vicar street, i think emmett should get at least 10% of these to distribute to members of this site.....well what do others think?? I think we should start a 10% for EskimoFriends campaign........

[marina]

what Dave said

[Gatsby]

its a great idea in theory but its up to his management to do that and i cant see it happening really... unless of course we campaign against it and send emails to fiona.... all in all people of the public are still going to be in majourity and if people buy those tickets off touts it shows that they are big fans anyways to go to that extreme to get their hands on the tickets...

[DaveG]

yeah but 10% is still only 150 tickets and i think that the band would be delighted to know that these tickets are going to people who have been dedicated to damien's music for a very long time.......come on look at all the effort emmett goes to with this site, keeping us informed of everything that goes on and brendan's irish music central site is now a beacon for irish music and he can't seem to get his hands on a damo tickets....i just think that it unfair on people who have gone to so much effort to promote damo's and other irish artists' music to not be at least given a first refusal on tickets.......i'm sure that everyone here is deighted every time a new fan arrives and tells us how much damien's music means to them, so it's not like people here are being elitist and saying that only we should get tickets, just feel that an allocation of 150 to this fan site would be a great gesture on behalf of the band, management and the promoters.......and did i mention that ticketbastard should be banned from operating[img]smileys/smiley7.gif[/img]

[Wheels]

Guys, for now forget whether you think it is possible to find a solution and whether you think it will ever happen. Just start thinking of alternative ways of selling the tickets. We'll worry about changing over to the system afterwards.

So we have one idea (with a few variations) so far, have some kind of membership system and allocate tickets to those members.

There must be other ideas. Throw them out there people... even the stupid ones. That tatoo our asses one became ID cards...

You could say sell tickets at the door only... (we'll worry about crowd trouble later). You could say no tickets... just collect at the door with ID (similar to Jewellers idea, just without the members club). They could be sold only through Damiens official site (although not everyone can get to the net and their system probably couldn't handle it). What else?

[DaveG]

damo lottery?

[marina]

i like the sound of this thread.....

[GlttrGrrl]

I think fan club idea works really well.. Pearl Jam has been using it for years, and it is absolutely amazing. It has gone through some variations, which I will detail below, but seems to have finally come to a fair, reasonable way of doing it.


First, there's the fan club. You have to be a member of the fan club to get tickets. Membership was free at first, then started charging a minimal membership fee that has slowly increased over time to $15 a year - over 12 years, that's not really much of an increase.


Members of the fan club have ID numbers that ranks their seniority in the club.


A few years ago Pearl Jam did a lottery for tickets to a few of their shows...you had to mail in postcards with your contact info, and if you won the lottery, they gave you a ring and told you how to get your tickets. You pay for the tickets in cash at the window on the day of the show - this meant the box office was open many hours before the show to allow for the thousands of tickets to be distributed (none were distributed in advance of the show so that scalpers(or as people here call them touts - please explain the origin of that to me) couldn't get their hands on tickets to sell before the show. The system worked okay, but it was hard to know how many postcards to send in - I sent in 50 and I got tickets. I know a guy who sent in over 300 and did not get tickets.


Later on they used a non-ticketbastard ticket agent. Tickets could only be ordered over the phone via a 1-800 number. The number was given to fan club members over a month in advance of the time it was released to the general public. Tickets went on sale over the phone for fans at a specific time, with a certain number of tickets alotted for the fan sale, and the rest saved for the public sale. This, in my opinion, was a fiasco, and many fan club members were left out in the cold because there just weren't enough phone lines to accomodate everyone, and scalpers got their hands on plenty of tickets. I wound up paying three times the ticket price to get into the show, which was AMAZING, but still...getting tickets was a bitch.


The system that has worked for a few years is this: Announce the tour dates to the fan club months in advance of the shows. Each fan club member can order 2 tickets to a particular show. It used to be that fan club members could only get fan club tickets to one show on the tour - this was to ensure that all fan club members got to go to at least one show on the tour, and while it may not seem fair to everyone, I think it is fair to ensure that all the fans get to go if they want to. Now each fan club member can order 2 tickets to any show on the tour - we can can get fan club seats for all the shows if we want. It used to be that you could order one or two tickets to a show, but now you have to order two tickets to the show - they don't sell singles through the fan club.


So, what happens is fan club members mail in their ticket orders with their payment by a certain cut-off date. If you're too late, it's just too bad. Fan club tickets can only be picked up after 3pm on the day of the show - this, again, is so that the tickets cannot be scalped, which they almost never are. For seated shows, the way the tickets are based on seniority - the more senior you are in the fan club, the closer you will be to the stage. This doesn't matter for GA shows. So the fan club number are broken up into blocks. Block one is the first 5 rows in front of the stage in the center - these go to the most senior members of the club who have ordered tickets for that show - the second block is the 6th to 10th rows in the center, etc. etc.


Ticket seats are not assigned to particular people before you pick them up. The way this works is they have lists of fan club members broken down by seniority at the ticket window....the first person to show up from the members who are in block one will get front row seats....so the earlier you pick up your tickets, the better the tickets will be, but you'll still have really good seats no matter when you show up. Over the past three years, I have had seats in 2nd row center, 3rd row center and 8th row center - I have been in the fan club since the very beginning. Pearl Jam values their fans more than any other artist I know, and they treat us well. It's awesome. I know that I will never have to worry about getting good seats to any of their shows.


BUT, here is where this will not work for shows like Vicar St. - for shows that are announced late or are added because of demand or are benefit gigs, there is no fan club seniority. The fan club tries its best to make sure that it accommodates fans when it can, but the above system would not work for a show where the tickets go on sale less than a month before the concert. Pearl jam fans don't really mind this - mostly because we get good seats for all the other shows, so it's no big deal. The system can't possibly work for spur-of-the-moment gigs.


I DO think that they should have put tickets onsale online for fans only before they were released for the general public like they did for the american shows. I have no idea why they didn't do that.


That was REALLY long, but it's chock full of ideas, I swear Edited by: GlttrGrrl

[marina]

cheers darlin'...interesting idea....think it'll work here peops?

[Enoch]

Ha, a Pearl Jam Fan Club Tour de Force .. some great ideas there.


I love Pearl Jam.

[Wheels]

Thanks GlttrGrrl... Why would that not work for shows announced late?

[Michelle Joey]

The official website is good though I'm nearly certain it was Damien that aoplogised on it yesterday but don't annoy Fiona-she has enough on her plate!

[Wheels]

Huh? How are we annoying Fiona?

[GlttrGrrl]

It wouldn'twork for the gigs announced late because there's not enough time to announce it to the fans in advance, give them time to place their orders, confirm that they are current members of the fan club, and then announce it to the general public.


That makes me think of another idea - a fan club only on-line pre-sale. There could be a system where you use your personal fan club ID number to order a limited number of tickets on a special site - your ID number would only work once, so that other people can't use your ID to order more tickets, and it wouldn't be a general password (like the oh so clever password: damienrice for the tickets you order at musictoday.com) that scalpers could get their hands on just as easily. There's the problem of hackers and crashing computers, but it might work.

[daol20]

I'd be shocked if that was really Damien on the site yesterday. I hope it was and he saw how pissed off i was with the whole situation.


The idea of a club, and block booking tickets was something i thought of after i got stung without tickets for the December gig in Vicar St. and intended to email Fiona about it, but never did.


I'd like to think that something like a fan club would work, but as DaveG said, the sites like this one would only be allocated a small percentage. It would create other problems like, there would be more members on this site than tickets allocated for it.Edited by: daol20

[GlttrGrrl]

I think it was Damien who posted the apology. He said people would have another chance, and they did today.


I agree, the DR camp hasn't been too efficient at getting things done or done well, but that might provide fans like us the opportunity to step up and run things for the DR camp. We really care about it, so we can change it if we want.

[daol20]

If it was then it was great of him to sell more tickets. But again that only gave the people that had mid-day internet access, plus a credit-card.


I hope they could get something up and running soon, cos it'll be worse when the new album comes out.

[#Ian#]

Now I won't have a bad word said about Fiona, after I mailed her about all my confusion yesterday (see various threads where I recounted the whole sorry tale) she really went out of her way for me when she could have ignored me. I have tickets now.

The woman is a saint.

The fan club pre sale is a really good idea and speaking as someone who knows a little about these things from a programming aspect would be quite easy to implement. I would also like to see them sort out their bandwidth problems as I'm sure many people had problems with getting pages to display. I was actually thinking about this in work today. It could easily be done through the mailing list that is allready in place, use a random string generator to create an unique password is sent to each individual member and let them log in early and buy the tickets with those details, or even charge a small fee for the priority booking facility/fan club membership.

Or even alerting the mailing list prior to an official announcement through other media sources and letting us get a jump on everyone else. Ray Darcy was the first person to announce the gig yesterday morning and I'm sure it was his listenership that snapped up the tickets rather then mailing list memebers.

[marina]

id also like to christen DaveG a saint....he got me tickets.....woohoo!!