The GMGap Blog

It’s ALWAYS been tricky to get your hands on a ticket for a music gig or sports event. For example, the whole Michael Jackson’s marathon 50 date residency at London O2 sold out at 33 tickets PER MINUTE. How does an individual who’s at work when the tickets go on sale actually get a ticket?

Go to the second-hand market online.

Not so long ago, the only means to get hold of a second-hand music gig or sports ticket was through a tout outside the premises of the event. This meant paying over the odds, or even perhaps being handed bogus tickets which would likely be spotted as you entered the event - and that means you miss the game or concert while throwing away your cash by being defrauded.

However, matters have gotten much better for sports and music devotees. The secondary ticket market has cleaned up its act in the last 10 years or so, with much thanks to the internet. These days there is so much competition to resell tickets on the internet, the industry has actually become self-regulating. The tickets you sell don’t have insurance? I’l buy my ticket somewhere else! Many ticket sellers provide very cheap insurance if the music gig / sports event is called off. And with strong competition online, secondary tickets have dropped in price to the stage that sometimes you’re not spending a lot more than the face value price. Many ticket buyers look at prices between lots of traders selling secondary tickets for the same event. They evaluate the prices, seating, insurance, and even previous history of the vendor prior to deciding to buy or not - so the power has very much moved away from the tout of the previous times to the ticket purchaser.

Today you can get tickets for many kinds of sports events and concerts. From basketball games to soccer to cricket, right through to getting hold of front row seats for your favourite band; secondary tickets provide a second opportunity to go to the event you want to see. So what to anticipate online? Use a search engine like Google and enter in your keyphrase like Morrissey tickets, and you will see a huge array of secondary ticket agents who can offer that very ticket to you.

Not all people are happy with the idea of resale tickets though. Some people label secondary ticket brokers as leeches, and want to see the banning of resale tickets. They don’t seem to see the valuable function secondary tickets contribute : there are people who simply are unable to buy tickets when they are sold the first time around.