Robert's thoughts on the RAH ticket situation

Robert posted this in the comments section on the official site:

RS THOUGHTS ON RAH REFLECTIONS TICKET SALES
[I WROTE THIS LAST WEEK, BUT DIDN'T POST IT… NOT REALLY SURE WHY I CHANGED MY MIND… SO ALTHOUGH SOME OF THE INFO MAY BE A LITTLE OUT OF DATE, THE ESSENCE REMAINS CURRENT]
I REALIZE THAT BY PLAYING A LIMITED NUMBER OF MORE INTIMATE VENUES THERE WILL INEVITABLY BE A NUMBER OF DISAPPOINTED FANS WHO CAN'T GET TICKETS TO OUR SHOWS - AS WAS THE CASE IN SYDNEY EARLIER THIS YEAR… BUT I ONLY WANT TO PLAY THE 'REFLECTIONS' SHOW A FEW MORE TIMES BEFORE THE END OF THE YEAR IN VENUES SIMILAR TO THE SYDNEY OPERA HOUSE I CHOSE THE ROYAL ALBERT HALL IN LONDON, THE PANTAGES THEATRE IN LA AND THE BEACON THEATRE IN NYC BECAUSE THEY FEEL RIGHT THE TICKET PRICES REFLECT THE NATURE AND COST OF STAGING THE SHOW - THE HIGHEST PRICES ARE UNDOUBTEDLY EXPENSIVE, BUT I AGREED (AS I INVARIABLY DO WITH REGARDS CURE SHOWS) WHAT I FELT WAS A FAIR PRICING STRUCTURE WITH OUR AGENT AND PROMOTER… WE WILL BE PERFORMING AROUND 180 MINUTES OF MUSIC… AND SOME RAH TICKETS WERE MADE AVAILABLE FOR AS LITTLE AS £25...
I AM AWARE THAT SOME DISAPPOINTED FANS HAVE BEEN AIRING CONCERNS AT WHAT THEY SEE AS A CURE RAH SHOW "SOLD OUT TO TOUTS"… SO I PUT THESE CONCERNS TO OUR UK AGENT AND OUR UK PROMOTER (BEARING IN MIND THEIR CAVEAT "It’s important that the public isn’t made aware of the precise details of how the promoters and ticket agencies track down resellers, or this will just make them more careful and harder to locate" THE FOLLOWING ARE SELECTED EXTRACTS FROM THEIR FULL REPLIES TO ME) OUR AGENT WROTE:
- measures taken to limit touting / re-selling of tickets:
• only ‘trusted’ ticket agencies were used – companies who the promoter could rely on to go by the rules laid down for this show - 3 outlets in addition to the RAH box office
• ticket purchase was restricted to 4 per person
• agents were instructed to check for touts and members of the public re-selling their tickets and to cancel tickets in those cases
• sales were restricted to on-line – no ‘over-the-counter’ sales (where touting is more of a problem)
• to be as fair as possible to everyone, no pre sale was done – but even if there had been a pre sale the promoter suspects that there would still have been tickets being bought as a speculation and re-sold
• so far around 60 tickets have been cancelled, and checks will be ongoing
• ticket re-selling is a major problem, but as you know our promoter has a reputation for being particularly diligent in this area and is doing everything physically possible to limit the scale of the problem - It is estimated that there are currently some 200 tickets being offered for resale – and some of those will be the same tickets being offered via different websites. Although high, that number is actually quite a small proportion of the total tickets sold – and quite a lot less than has been seen for other shows of a similar stature. The implication is that the vast majority of tickets have gone to real fans who will be happy to simply turn up and see the show.
- the measures put in place would have made it very hard for tickets to end up with anything other than members of the public - most of the tickets being advertised for resale are pairs of tickets, so the likelihood is that the resellers are mainly fans themselves – buying their 4 tickets in order to go to the show, and sell two others (perhaps covering the cost of their own tickets)
- Here’s an example of one ad: This is a ticket to see THE CURE’s REFLECTIONS show at the Royal Albert Hall on Tuesday November 15th, where they’ll be performing their first 3 classic albums in full. This ticket is for STALL L ROW 2 (centre stage side of the walkway), offering a fantastic view of the stage. I’m also selling one more ticket (see my other auctions) for the seat right next to this one, unfortunately I cannot list the exact seat numbers as there’s a chance ticket agents will cancel these tickets, so please don’t ask. I bought these tickets for 2 friends who sadly can’t make it to the gig, so here’s your chance to see The Cure play this one off UK show. As soon as I have the ticket in hand I will send it on a Royal Mail Pre-1pm Guaranteed Next Day service free of charge (UK buyers only).
AND OUR PROMOTER WROTE: “The biggest problem we have nowadays is that the majority of the tickets touted are not being sold by professional touts - they are being sold by people who consider themselves genuine fans but who make it a point to buy the maximum number of tickets they can, and then look to make a bob or two by selling off the ones they don't plan to use”.
PERSONALISED TICKETS AND/OR TICKETS TIED TO CREDIT CARDS/ID ON THE DOOR WERE NOT AN OPTION… OUR PROMOTER AGAIN: It would not be feasible to have credit cards / ID checks on the door for every ticket - because of the capacity of the RAH, you'd never get that many people into the venue in time. We are able to do it for the Gallery because that's a relatively small number of people.”
(AND TO BE ABSOLUTELY EVEN HANDED, THIS FURTHER COMMENT ON MY THOUGHTS!!! "In his "Thoughts", Robert has not touched on the fact that the show sold out in a nano second and was x50 times over subscribed before sold out notices went up!") HOWEVER, BASED ON THE SMALL PERCENTAGE OF TICKETS ACTUALLY TURNING UP FOR RESALE, I AM REASONABLY SATISFIED THAT "The implication is that the vast majority of tickets have gone to real fans who will be happy to simply turn up and see the show." IS A FAIR SUMMARY
ONWARDS! RS
PS AND WHAT'S ALL THIS 'FINAL SHOWS' MUTTERING? THAT'S MY JOB!
Posted by CURE:ROBERT on 10/16/2011 9:55 PM (GMT-04:00}