Got two tickets for Weekend 1 as Ultra effed me over on my quest to purchase Early Birds from them a few days ago. Right now I am really considering skipping WMC next year altogether (been going 7 years straight) and use the $ towards Coachella, EDC Vegas and maybe a return trip to Ibiza (went in 2011 for the closing parties) for 2014.

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Gabriel & Dresden v2

Mitz I feel like this is also a bit of a backlash to the headliners this year.

Those of us who went know it was epic, but those who didn't are thinking "hmm, do I want Stone Roses and Blur again?"

That being said, I know the lineup in 2014 will blow this year out of the water so I gots mines!

AEG (who owns Goldenvoice) is trying to take Ticketmaster head on with its own ticketing thing, so I think they have some serious ticket-selling peeps behind the scenes.

I saw tickets for 200 bucks both weekend on CL and Stubhub, which really screws the people that are honestly just tryin to sell their tickets.

People over night would slash their prices on CL by 50-100 bucks the closer it got to the event.

I randomly emailed people some low balling offers (just to gauge the situation, I had a free band) and some of them emailed me back twice. 1st to regect the offer, and 2ndly asking "hey you still interested?!?"

So ya, a lot of people got screwed.

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the number of people who are trying to honestly sale their tickets are very low. lots of people who go to coachella just buy an extra ticket so they can sell it later.

i agree, though. it does suck if you just cant go and have to sell YOUR ticket and you take a hit. that's the risk you take when you buy a ticket to any event though.

you shouldn't be able to profit on a ticket, it's wrong. period.

I'm so pleased that scalpers got badly burned this year, but it's interesting that pre sale tickets to Coachella did not sell out this year. Is that because scalpers are not buying or has the whole festival scene peaked already? The supposedly hot tickets to Tomorroworld have not sold out either. What gives?

easy. scalpers aren't buying.

quote:

Originally posted by ptrpaul77 I'm so pleased that scalpers got badly burned this year, but it's interesting that pre sale tickets to Coachella did not sell out this year. Is that because scalpers are not buying or has the whole festival scene peaked already? The supposedly hot tickets to Tomorroworld have not sold out either. What gives?

Probably a combination of festival competition heating up and the collective realization that tickets could have been had cheaply on craigslist close to the event, leaving people less hyped to buy early tickets. I'm sure that mitz is right that scalping played a major role in the previous sellout so it's likely that tickets will sell in a slower fashion because the "gold rush" aspect is gone, maybe increasing once a lineup comes out?

Either way, we're still a long way away from both festivals and there's plenty of time for them to sell out. I don't think we need to look at non-instant sellouts as serious signs of decline because instant sellouts of 100k person festivals have only happened a few times AFAIK, both having extenuating circumstances. Coachella's sellout last year was fueled by scalping, and Tomorrowland's annual sellouts happen because it's the premier European festival and Belgium is really accessible compared to basically any destination in the US (especially Atlanta whose native scene isn't so strong on its own).

The major US festivals still sell out, and EDC Vegas sold out in record time with an increased capacity compared to last year. I think the market is doing fine.

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So many people people lost their ass last year on Coachella tickets, including scalpers, that's why it's not sold out. Honestly, I think it's stupid to buy a ticket for it when you can get one for nearly half of the face value a week before the event easily. Since they added two weekends the values plummeted.

TomorrowWorld on the other hand is a different problem. That was set up for low sales from the get go. No one wants to travel to ATL, and on top of that their dance community is tiny, and they have no realistically close major cities to help feed into that small pool, at least not any with large dance music communities. Then they made it 21+ and provided us with an all ages lineup.

By them choosing ATL, they wanted to target the international crowd that Tomorrowland is known for(ATL is the largest international airport hub), but the problem is it's not quite as easy to get into the US as with Belgium. Most countries citizens coming into the US need to get a visa, and that's not the easiest thing ever, and most don't even want to waste their time with it.

TomorrowWorld was horrible decision making from day one, and I honestly don't think it will be there next year.