Thursday, March 21, 2013

TicketMaster, StubHub, TiqIQ, And The Yankees


I really do not understand all this commotion over the New York Yankees tickets this off season. First we heard that the Yankees opted out of the MLB deal with Stubhub and decided to start their own Yankees Ticket Exchange with the help of Ticketmaster and now we hear that the Yankees are suing Stubhub to prevent them from opening up a shop near the stadium. I just have to ask myself why. What do the Yankees care how much places like TiqIQ and Stubhub sell the tickets for? Last I checked the tickets on both of those sites were second hand tickets, which means someone has already paid the Yankees astronomical asking price once for these tickets that are, in most cases, not going to be used without the help of these second hand ticket sites. If it were not for places like TiqIQ and Stubhub you would not garner nearly as much revenue if the tickets went wasted, which means no concessions, no parking, no merchandise, etc, than if they were sold below face value. TiqIQ's job is finding the best deals and sellers out there for you, and for this game you may want to have a look at GoTickets for New York Yankees tickets. I do not purchase season tickets mainly because I live in Atlanta, Georgia but even if I did I think I would have to resist feeding into the Yankees greed and would purchase ALL my tickets off sites like this. I can understand that making money is the ultimate goal in baseball because baseball is a business first but there comes a point where a team goes to far and the Yankees are walking that dangerous line right now...

2 comments:

  1. nyyankeefanforeverMarch 22, 2013 at 7:20 AM

    As a third-generation Yankee fan, I'll explain it to you Daniel. The problem, in a nutshell, is the harm caused buy unscrupulous scalpers to season ticket holders and single-game ticket buyers: in other words, the team's primary stakeholders and biggest fans.

    There's two types of scams scalpers use to game the StubHub system. The first one involves posting large blocks of phantom tickets in desirable sections and is designed to depress sales by legit season ticketholders who can't make it to the game and generally buy in smaller blocks of four or less. That sort of scam doesn't hurt single game ticket buyers because when they click to buy one or more of the phantom tickets they simply disappear as "no longer available" like they were just sold, but they screw the legit ticket holders who can't make it to the game and are just trying to get fair value for their tickets. The second scam is where the scalper lists actual tickets in his possession on the website where they can be bought and downloaded and then selling them a second time outside the stadium. Many StubHub customers buy late to get the cheapest price and many people who buy tickets far in advance and are looking for extra tickets for friends or family tagging along (often season ticketholders) get to the park early to enjoy the stadium amenities, a meal, tour of Monument Park or whatever. The result is the StubHub buyer will arrive with a pdf facimile of a ticket that has already gotten somebody else in and they're denied entry. (If you don't think that happens a lot, ask any ticket taker the next time you go to a game.) The only guarantee resellers like StubHub make about the tickets they offer is that if a ticket sold through their website is invalid they'll refund your money. Unfortunately, that guarantee doesn't help you on game day when you're standing at the turnstile with a line of people waiting behind you and a stupid look on your face as you're being told the ticket you printed off your laptop at home is invalid and to please move aside for the paying customers.

    The fact is most teams have an exchange for ticket package holders like the one the Yankees and Angels just set up and Yankee season ticketholders like my family have been howling for this for a long long time. It not only guarantees the tickets are legit and costs a fraction of what resellers like StubHub charge; it also allows ticket package holders a vehicle for swapping tickets with other package holders seated adjacent to them for more convenient dates when a scheduling conflict arises and to make offers for additional tickets from them. If StubHub was willing to be a little more diligent about policing its site and not being quite so greedy with their fees, this would probably have never become an issue. As it stands, you can still buy Yankee tickets on StubHub. The only difference will be the delivery method. Original ticket holders can still offer their tickets at a steep discount if they wish. The ticket exchange is a good deal all the way around for season ticketholders who the team has a logical interest in protecting and providing added value; single-game ticket buyers willing to pay the fair price for a ticket guaranteed to be legitimate and don't wish to subsidize the scalping industry (yes, believe it or not, such fans do exist) and, of course, the team which has an understandable interest in protecting their brand and is providing a necessary fee-based service for a lower price than the reseller. The only people who will actually be hurt by this are the scalpers. I expect you'll be seeing more and more sports teams go to this model in the near future. My profound apologies for the length of this post. I hope you found it enlightening.


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