I'm searching TM for tickets for tonight's 5/14 show.

Good loge come up for $25, but I decide to try again.

I search again and the EXACT SAME SEATS, one minute later, are the $181 tickets!

What a trip!

sro100 said:

I'm searching TM for tickets for tonight's 5/14 show.

Good loge come up for $25, but I decide to try again.

I search again and the EXACT SAME SEATS, one minute later, are the $181 tickets!

What a trip!

Ticketmobster are the lowest of the lowest. I have some experience with buying tickets for concerts in London and experienced why Ticketmaster is adequately called Ticketbastard or Ticketmobster. They start sales or presales and sell inferior tickets to the fans first. The best tickets they keep themselves and start selling them through their own ‘official’ scalping channels like Viagogo for much more money. When sales are slow, bit by bit the better tickets will come back from Viagogo and will be sold through ticketmaster. On the day of the concerts the few really good tickets that are not sold for excessive prices on Viagogo and the likes will be sold for the regular price. After some disappointing experiences I bought tickets for Prince in the O2 a couple of years ago on the day of the concert while driving from Holland to London, front row seats that had become available that day for the regular price.

[Edited 5/14/11 13:36pm]

I 2nd that motion they r ticketmobster!

jillis said:

sro100 said:

I'm searching TM for tickets for tonight's 5/14 show.

Good loge come up for $25, but I decide to try again.

I search again and the EXACT SAME SEATS, one minute later, are the $181 tickets!

What a trip!

Ticketmobster are the lowest of the lowest. I have some experience with buying tickets for concerts in London and experienced why Ticketmaster is adequately called Ticketbastard or Ticketmobster. They start sales or presales and sell inferior tickets to the fans first. The best tickets they keep themselves and start selling them through their own ‘official’ scalping channels like Viagogo for much more money. When sales are slow, bit by bit the better tickets will come back from Viagogo and will be sold through ticketmaster. On the day of the concerts the few really good tickets that are not sold for excessive prices on Viagogo and the likes will be sold for the regular price. After some disappointing experiences I bought tickets for Prince in the O2 a couple of years ago on the day of the concert while driving from Holland to London, front row seats that had become available that day for the regular price.

[Edited 5/14/11 13:36pm]

He's not lying, I've experienced the same problems in London. One show I bought tickets on the first minute they were available and got upper tier tickets. The other show I ordered tickets the day of the show itself and got front row

At least you Westerners have a chance at $25 great seats. The closest thing to a cheap good seat in the South was $85. The cheapest ones were all at the top of the arenas.

It has been really difficult & frustrating to figure out the method to the madness...

DaveG said:

It has been really difficult & frustrating to figure out the method to the madness...

I searched madly on Wednesday when they went on sale, but didn't want to sit in the colonnade. I searched just now and got Loge 2 seats for $25. Lesson - don't buy seats until the last minute. If I had paid $70 for those seats two days ago, I'd be pissed

[Edited 5/14/11 17:55pm]

Ya'll can't blame Prince for this shit--it is Ticketmaster all the way. They need to do what other venues do--show a map of available seats left and you click on the seat you want. Their system is archaic, inefficient, and designed to drive people nuts!

purplethunder3121 said:

Ya'll can't blame Prince for this shit--it is Ticketmaster all the way. They need to do what other venues do--show a map of available seats left and you click on the seat you want. Their system is archaic, inefficient, and designed to drive people nuts!

Ticketmaster & Live Nation are now the same company, so the same people making this happen are the ones that made the shows happen at all. And you can bet they are doing it with Prince's knowledge and permission. I think they are experimenting with how to max out revenues using "dynamic pricing". It's like airline pricing... they change depending on whether they're in demand or not.

From what I can tell the upper seats & dance floor area are staying at $25, and the floor & nice loges are jumping around. If it looks like a sellout (like last Saturday), no $25 seats are available at all, only the $200+ tickets. But if it's looking like an empty night, they'll give you VIP tables for that price. Just depends on supply & demand.

Great $25 loges (7 row N) for tonight's show were on sale this morning at 11, as of right now they're slightly less great (25 row C) but still can be had. But when they went on sale days ago, you didn't have Loge as an option for $25. They were trying to get $70 or more for them.

It can be a great thing if you get an awesome seat at the last minute for $25, or even $10, but if the show is sold out you're not going to be able to do that. It's risky but can pay off. So if you say "ah I'm going for it" and shell out $200 or $500 for an amazing seat in advance, hopefully it's not worth any less to you if the person next to you says "oh I got these for $25 a few minutes ago."

I'm the kind of guy that won't go unless I can get decent seats for a cheap price so, I'm in favor of it! I'm just used to waiting until I can find a seat I want to sit in for the price I want to pay.