Diana Ross in Orlando, February 11th

**rrussi** · 12-20-2014, 08:17 AM

Advertised yesterday, December 19th, in the Orlando Sentinel...Diana Ross, In The Name Of Love Tour. The event is at the new Dr. Phillips Performing Arts Center. The tickets are $46--$126 and went on sale at the box office yesterday @ 10am. Unfortuantely, scalping is a legit business now and that is about the only way to get them...on line thru companies that even admit to being a third party in the sale; the tickets are now triple the price.

**rrussi** · 12-20-2014, 08:22 AM

I finally reached a "live" person at the box office who says members of Dr. Phillips Center have had access to the tickets for weeks. They buy them up and resale them to the companies now advertising them online. How can this be legal???

Anyway, I was able to get 2 thru the box office on row K in the orchestra section@$96each. Then I have to pay $23 service fee for ordering by phone.

And just how aware are the "stars" of all this???

**reese** · 12-20-2014, 08:29 AM

Some stars are trying to combat this, but I don't know how successful they've been. And now Ticketmaster has legitimized it with offering resale tickets for some shows on their site.

In any event, it does suck that the third party sellers jack up the prices. I have gone online the minute that tickets go on sale, and end up with a seat in the back. On such occasions, I have resorted to StubHub.

**milven** · 12-20-2014, 11:33 AM

Broadway shows have designated premium seats for quite a while and sell them for hundreds of dollars through Ticketmaster or Telecharge. They are really no different than the seats along side them except for price. I always felt that it kind of made the theatre a scalper because they held the tickets themselves and sold them for a high price.

About a month ago, I was trying to get tickets for a matinee about two hours before curtain. I was going to buy these high priced premium tickets. But while clicking BUY, it told me that the seats were either being purchased by someone else or that the seats were being re-priced. I clicked again within less than a minute and was able to buy the tickets at regular price. So the theatre re-priced the seats when no one paid the high price and curtain time was rapidly arriving..

So if I understand the system correctly, the scalpers are now in competition with the theatre owners who hold prime tickets for themselves and try to sell them at a high price. And then if they are not sold on day of performance, they release them at regular price.

Kind of sucks doesn't it?

**rrussi** · 12-20-2014, 12:03 PM

It is so deceitful for the consumers! The Motown on Broadway show will be at the same venue in March. Now I know why someone told me they had a friend who bought two tickets at $340 each. I said that is ridiculous. I've never paid anywhere near that to see the real Motown stars.

supremester · 12-20-2014, 05:11 PM

I know how you feel but it's not really deceitful - it's capitalism. Like Hotels, air fares and the like, many live performance promoters use supply/demand to determine ticket pricing. Sometimes, there are auctions for tickets [[Babs, Ross, Madge etc have done this) sometimes Ticketmaster offers "Platinum Seats" at huge prices. They will post a pair of $150 tix in the third row for $390 each. If they sell quickly, they list another at $415 - until all the seats they held back are gone. Broadway houses are doing the Premium Seating thing - leading Book Of Mormon tickets to go to $495 at peak holiday times for the very best seats. There are all kinds of gimmicks to sell tix. BergenPac has Aretha tix at 4-for-the-price-of-3 and sold the allotted amount and now are hoping to sell the remainder at full price. The Tempt/Tops Broadway fiasco has innumerable promotions going on, to some success, and will sell the rest at half price at TKS and the B.O. Caesars Palace does the premium seating thing beautifully. DPAC in Durham is holding back blocks of Ross tix and raising the price levels because of demand. Many $80 seats became $101.25 - ditto Kings Theatre.
Sucks? yeah, but it is what it is.

**skooldem1** · 12-20-2014, 05:24 PM

So overall, what does everyone think is the best way to get good tickets [[close to the stage)? I have purchased tickets online and at the box office for many acts over the years. They both seem to offer the same tickets. Even if you are online when they go on sale, or standing in line when the box office opens, blocks of good tickets aren't available. In this day and age, is Stub hub the best?

supremester · 12-20-2014, 06:14 PM

Yes, Stub hub and the like. If you are wanting Ross tix, sometimes I can help out at face value. It depends - some acts I want to be up close to - others, I don't care. Same with plays.

**rrussi** · 12-20-2014, 06:25 PM

What is becoming of our greedy society? At the height of their career, I paid top ticket price for the 4th row for Diana Ross & the Supremes in April 1969. The cost of the ticket: $6.00!
They also had $5 an $4 sections.

**reese** · 12-20-2014, 11:44 PM

Sometimes waiting until the day of a show can pay off. About 10 years ago, I remember being indecisive about seeing Donna Summer. I didn't decide to go until the afternoon of the show. When I went on Ticketmaster, I actually got a first row seat. I think it was because the allotment of seats kept for the artist were unused and put back into the pot.

Also, I've found having a membership to venues gives you good access to pre-sales and the like.

**rrussi** · 12-22-2014, 08:46 AM

By the way, the ad that appears in the paper for this tour shows a photo of her taken about 20 years ago.

**reese** · 12-22-2014, 08:51 AM

Originally Posted by rrussi

By the way, the ad that appears in the paper for this tour shows a photo of her taken about 20 years ago.

Most ads I've seen in recent years have been using the photo from ONE WOMAN or one from EVERY DAY IS A NEW DAY.

**milven** · 12-22-2014, 09:20 AM

Originally Posted by rrussi

What is becoming of our greedy society? At the height of their career, I paid top ticket price for the 4th row for Diana Ross & the Supremes in April 1969. The cost of the ticket: $6.00!
They also had $5 an $4 sections.

Tickets for their Lincoln Center concert were $ 6.50. Top Price for a Broadway ticket was $ 9.95 and I was probably getting paid three dollars an hour, if that. It is called inflation.

I don't like this premium seating either. But I do remember occasionally buying tickets from scalpers - which was sometimes a hassle - and then hoping that they were legit.

Occasionally, I do get these premium tickets for Broadway shows on line and the tickets are waiting for me at the box office. Safer and easier.

**milven** · 12-22-2014, 09:44 AM

Years ago, I remember going to a local mall to buy tickets at Ticketron. Now everything is on line.

Also, back then they had ticket resellers [[that's a nice word for scalpers) that had local storefronts to sell tickets. Now these resellers are on line too.

But I got an inside education of how these scalpers work. Many years ago [[in the dark ages

) one of these scalpers wanted us to apply to Ticketron to get terminals in our stores to sell tickets for Broadway shows and concerts. The plan was for us to purchase blocks of tickets as soon as they went on line, and then sell them to him. He would give us some sort of commission for each ticket and then he would mark these tickets up a lot and scalp them.

I never did it, but if some sort of internet version of this exists, I can see how the best seat tickets are gone the instant they go on sale.

From Wikopedia:

Ticketron was a computerized event ticketing technology that was in operation from the 1960s until it was purchased by Ticketmaster in 1991.

Ticketron was the name of a service created by Ticket Reservations Systems, Inc. The company changed its name to Ticketron in July, 1969. The system used terminals that it called "electronic box offices" that were located in publicly accessible locations, such as banks and department stores.

Ticketron was owned by computer maker Control Data from 1968 until 1990.

The original software resided on a pair [[one for backup) of Control Data Corporation 1700 computers that were located in the basement of the Beverly Hilton Hotel. The system had back-up power generators to help ensure un-interruptable service. The system was designed to insure that a given 'seat' at an event could not be sold more than once.

**reese** · 12-22-2014, 10:55 AM

I had a friend who was down on his luck at one point. He told me that resellers would give him and some of his other homeless friends a lot of money to stand in line and buy the maximum number of seats they could for shows. And then of course, they would give these tickets to the reseller.

I am glad that tickets are now accessible online. I remember many a morning getting to a box office hours before it opened to get a good spot in line. I don't miss that at all.

I've done a lot of buying on Stub Hub, and I've never had any trouble. But I must admit that I still get a slight twinge every time I pull out one of their tickets for scanning at the venue, thinking that I received a counterfeit.

**rrussi** · 12-25-2014, 10:44 AM

I think the venue itself is in on the scalping. How could all the good seats be gone and show up on another site using the venue's name with a disclaimer that they are a third party in the sell of the tickets. A friend took her mother to the matinee performance of Fidler on the Roof two weeks ago at this same venue. She told me she paid $700 for the two tickets. That is absolutely outrageous.