Ticket Industry News: Tickets to the 2010 Olympic Games

Reseller market not cowed by 2010 organizers plans to crack down on scalpers

VANCOUVER — People who fail to nab any of the scarce tickets that will be available for the 2010 Olympic Games shouldn't worry, says a leading Vancouver ticket broker.

He'll have them for sale - and soon. Despite Vancouver Games organizers' repeated claim that they'll police tickets sold outside authorized channels, going so far as invalidating them, the resale market will not be cowed, said Mario Livich of ShowTime tickets.

"We'll be very active in selling thousands of tickets for the 2010 Games," he said.

"It's a legal business, the buying and selling of tickets, and it's a much-valued service in the marketplace."

Tickets for the Vancouver Olympics go on sale Oct. 3 through an application system that will allow people just over a month to decide how many and which tickets they'd like to buy for the Games.

For those events where demand exceeds supply tickets will be sold via a lottery system.

While tickets for single events will be for sale, organizers are also promoting 58 different "Olympic experience" packages which combine multiple events at prices ranging from $140 to $1,267.

Package orders will be filled before individual events, so organizers say the best shot at some of the most popular and expensive seats will be to buy packages.

The lowest price for a single sporting event ticket is $25, while the highest is $775 for a gold-medal hockey ticket. That's not including surcharges or the cost of transportation, numbers that won't be available until closer to Oct. 3.

Over a million Olympic tickets will be available to the masses, but organizers have admitted that at events like gold-medal hockey, the vast majority of seats are being sold to "Olympic family" members, including sponsors and officials. The number of tickets that will be allotted to the public for each event has not been released.

That's why a brisk resale market is inevitable, Livich said.

"Something of this magnitude touches all aspects of society and people want to be part of it in any way they can," he said.

He predicted having tickets for sale as early as this fall, though he declined to say where he would get them. The first phase of official ticket sales ends Nov. 7.

Empty seats were common at many of the less popular Games events in Beijing, which was blamed in part on Olympic sponsors and officials who didn't use their tickets.

Street scalpers said their inventory mostly came from those two groups.

At the same time, scores of people showed up in Beijing with tickets they'd bought online that turned out to be fake.

Vancouver organizers are well within their rights to make sure none of that happens, said Larry Witherspoon, the chief executive officer of Tickets.com, the company working with Vancouver to provide ticket sales and support.

"Given enough time and effort I think you can go through and comb sites and ensure you aren't seeing any tickets that aren't authorized out there," Witherspoon said, though he acknowledged it's hard to police those posted by regular folks just looking to make a buck.

Tickets.com is helping Vancouver organizers build their resale system, expected to launch next year.

"The secondary market exists because the primary market ticketing providers never addressed it back seven or eight years ago," said Witherspoon.

"So they allowed the niche to form which actually became a pretty popular and powerful niche that generates a lot of revenue."

The resale ticket industry is estimated to be worth about $6 billion worldwide, lucrative enough that primary ticket sellers like Ticketmaster have jumped on the bandwagon, snapping up resale companies.

The resellers make their money by marking up prices as high as the market will bear.

During the 2006 Winter Games in Torino, resellers were hawking gold-medal tickets for over $1,000, for tickets sold originally for a maximum of $540.

But Vancouver organizers stress their market will be different.

"There's no need for a middle man," said Dave Cobb, vice-president of marketing for the organizing committee.

"(Their) pure objective is to make as much money as they possibly can."

Organizers' aim is not to allow tickets to be sold for more than their face value.

Livich applauds the effort but says it just might not work.

"Their threat may put a bit of a chill on people who wish to sell their tickets for whatever reason, whether for profit or they can't make an event, and the worry is this could result in empty seats which doesn't serve anybody's interest," he said.

"I think that should be the main focus of any ticket initiative - to make sure there are bums in the seats."

The final capacities of venues also won't be decided until much closer to the start of the Games on Feb. 12, 2010.

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