The History of Ticketmaster

Ticketmaster was founded in Phoenix, Arizona, by college staffers Albert Leffler and Peter Gadwa as well as businessman Gordon Gunn III. Leffler came up with Ticketmaster as the name for the new company.

Oct. 2, 1976

Pearl Jam was set to go on tour but canceled over ticket prices. This triggered a federal investigation into Ticketmaster.

Electric Light Orchestra at the University of New Mexico was Ticketmaster’s first ticketed concert.

The investigation was closed without action. However, the Justice Department said it would continue to monitor the situation.

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marketplace dominance to charge what were extremely high service fees at the time, as well as sign exclusive deals with major concert venues, leaving performers and customers with few to no alternatives.

Pearl Jam was supported by other acts of that era, including Garth Brooks, according to the Associated Press.

The investigation was closed without action July 5, 1995, due to no lawsuit being filed, according to the Associated Press. However, the antitrust division said it would continue to monitor the situation.

Service Fees and Dynamic Pricing

Currently, Ticketmaster is earning its profits by using two different models of income: service fees and dynamic pricing.

Ticketmaster shares on its site that fees are determined in partnership with their client, I.E. the artists or the sports team you are buying the ticket for. They cover things like the technology, equipment and handling fees of the tickets.

“The classic service fee that everyone hates is the convenience fee for printing your tickets at home …,” Nesson said, “But that is just another form of price discrimination.”

Price discrimination, Nesson said, is when a company assesses its client base and charges one consumer more than the other because the consumer is willing to pay more. This is a commonly used practice for buying plane tickets or booking an Uber, Nesson said.

In 2011, Ticketmaster introduced dynamic pricing, which was a concept already being used at the time.

According to the Cambridge Dictionary, it is, “a way of setting the price for a product or service in which the price changes according to how much demand there is for it at a particular time (how many people want to buy it or pay for it).”

It would work like hotels or airlines; the more people want to buy tickets, the more expensive the tickets become. This is to isolate the fans willing to pay thousands of dollars and get them to pay that, while fans who want cheaper tickets will wait to buy them on the day of the show.

Nesson said this dynamic pricing model is most likely a form of price discrimination, from an economist’s perspective. Sometimes, this dynamic pricing model is more hidden, being called a VIP package or a Platinum package.

“[Ticketmaster tries] to figure out how many people are trying to buy tickets for this show. If there’s a lot, [its] going to change [to] a higher price, and if there’s fewer, [its] going to charge a lower price,” Nesson said.

Ticketmaster and Live Nation merged into one company under the approval of the U.S. government authorities.

Jan. 25, 2010

Ticketmaster started using the process of dynamic pricing — a concept that has been used for other businesses. This helps Ticketmaster and artists make a larger profit.

Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour presale opened.

Ticketmaster announced on Twitter they had “insufficient remaining ticket inventory” and could not hold the general ticket sale.

The U.S. Senate held the first day of the hearing for Ticketmaster.

Jan. 24th, 2023