What’s Up With This? (part 2)

A couple of weeks ago I wrote about my experience in trying to buy Boston Bruins playoff tickets online.  I discussed how my son was on the Ticketmaster website at exactly 11:00 AM when they went on sale.  There were no tickets available except the $250+ club seats.   

A heard from a few “in the know” peeps who gave me some reasons why this may have happened:

1) The season ticket holders not only had rights to their seats but could buy additional seats.

2) As part of the effort to attract more season ticket holders, the Bruins offered new 2010 season ticket holders the opportunity to purchase playoff tickets.

Both of these reasons make sense. Are they the only reasons?

So if the above reasons are true and season ticket holders take all the tickets, why even have an on-sale?  If you have no tickets to sell except for a few club seats why promote the on-sale?  Just release the few tickets.  You know fans are going to go online and look anyway.

Yesterday, they put this Sunday’s playoff game on sale.  I was at the Ticketmaster site before 11:00 AM and kept refreshing until the event popped up.  One of my friends did the same thing.  Guess what, the only tickets available at 11:00 AM were those $250+ club seats again.  However, there were lots of tickets available over on TicketsNow. 

I did something I have never done before.  I purchased tickets from TicketsNow.  Yes, I paid above face value. Yes, they have all the infamous TM service fees attached. Yes, this spoiled ticket marketing guy is going to sit in the nose bleeds (it’s all I could afford).

I took the bullet for two reasons: 1) my son and his friend really want to go to the game; 2) I thought this would be a good learning experience for event marketers like you and I.

The next step in the process will be getting the tickets.  I had to pay $14.00 for FedEx shipping.  I will let you know how the rest of my experience goes.

Tags: Boston Bruins, club seats, perks for season tickets, playoff tickets, purchasing tickets online, season ticket holders, Ticketmaster, ticketmaster.com, TicketsNow