How to push down concert prices – Latest News
Concert ticket prices have change into a national disaster — a lot in order that the Department of Justice has filed a lawsuit to break up Live Nation, which owns Ticketmaster.
Twenty-seven state attorneys basic are nonetheless pursuing a legal course to break the 2 firms up.
At this stage, that’s simply overkill.
I’ve a easy resolution to resolve the problem. But to perceive that resolution, you could first attempt to perceive the issue.
I’ve been doing simply that after being concerned within the music industry, and now offering financial advice to many purchasers within the industry.
Concert ticket prices have change into a national disaster — a lot in order that the Department of Justice has filed a lawsuit to break up Live Nation, which owns Ticketmaster. REUTERS
The proposed breakup of Live Nation, which controls many concert venues, and Ticketmaster, which is used for many venues to challenge their tickets, seems to be a normal antitrust motion towards a monopoly.
But separating the 2 entities, at this level, could also be almost inconceivable.
Live Nation makes a small share on selling live shows. That share is at all times negotiable, however most of the ticket price goes to the venue and the artist.
The means the company makes its money is on ticket charges — Ticketmaster. If you review that company’s financial statements, which could be accomplished on the Internet, they really misplaced money two of the final three years on their live shows.
Moreover, although Live Nation controls a sizable portion of the promoters’ market, that is probably not the worst factor for the public. In days previous, concert promotions had been left to people who had been usually unscrupulous.
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As a report label controller and tour accountant for the then-largest tour on the earth, I skilled that just about 50 years in the past. We obtained a substantial cashier’s test for our guarantee from the promoter of our Detroit concert prior to a show. The cashier’s test was faux.
That was how the industry was for a few years. Live Nation has cleaned up that aspect of the business.
It’s not the businesses at present driving our hovering prices. It’s the artists.
Live performances have change into the artists’ main source of income. Their income from album gross sales has dried up. They live on charges from music apps like Spotify and Tidal. And although Spotify pays large sums in royalties, solely a comparatively small quantity makes it to artists.
ASCAP and BMI are nonetheless accumulating royalties for radio, and from venues taking part in music, however that isn’t enough to feed the deserving artists who’ve created the music we love.
The backside line is that artists make their money after we pay to see them. They used to do live shows to promote their CD gross sales. Now they do it to pay their dwelling bills.
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I’ve been shocked by the prices. Having seen Elton John on the Troubadour and Bruce Springsteen on the Roxy years in the past for a pittance, it’s jaw-dropping.
The fabulous Bruno Mars was the first-ever act on the Intuit Dome. Four tickets for our household? $1,750.
I noticed the Paul Simon farewell tour years in the past. Somehow, after that goodbye, he’s taking part in again on the Hollywood Bowl this summer time. I appeared on the ticket prices and barfed.
A tough estimate of the box workplace on that one show is $2.5 million or more. You don’t have to be a math professor to perceive why he’s acting at age 84.
Many industry insiders I spoke with can’t work out who’s shopping for the tickets for such outrageously priced live shows.
One individual mentioned the oldsters paying more than $2,000 for Taylor Swift live shows had been forgoing eating out, and never attending mid-level band exhibits.
wolterke – stock.adobe.com
Those bands, in flip, are being squeezed as a result of demand has dried up whereas the massive names are soaking up substantial parts of the concert money pie.
When tickets sell on the secondary market, artists are upset that people are profiteering off them. That has pushed the initial price for tickets increased, because the artists or the promoters consider that they need to be those profiting — not some freeloader on StubHub.
So, what’s my resolution? Stop shopping for the tickets.
This is a free market. If people stop shopping for, the industry can’t charge the present freight. We all make decisions the place our hard-earned {dollars} are going.
A youthful pal of mine referred to as me whereas I used to be conceiving this column and he instructed me he had independently come to the identical conclusion. He desires to see Bruce Springsteen on tour in Austin, Texas. He appeared on the prices — and he mentioned no means.
He additionally needed to take his younger daughters to see Bruno. After seeing the fee of tickets, his daughters will simply have to wait.
And so the reply to high prices shouldn’t be more lawsuits.
Rather, it’s merely to stop going to live shows till prices come down.
The resolution is in our arms. Supply and demand — primary economics.
Bruce Bialosky, a two-time presidential appointee, is a licensed public accountant specializing in taxes.
