Saturday, August 10, 2013

God For Kid Rock

From the Detroit Free Press: When Kid Rock unveiled his $20 ticket innovation in the spring, he didn’t mince words: He was out to rock the concert industry.
Ticket prices had gotten out of hand, the Detroit star said. Fans were disgruntled. Pitting himself against the “highway robbery” of $200-plus tickets for acts such as Jay Z and Justin Bieber, Rock declared himself a music-biz revolutionary: For his 40-date summer tour, seats in every section would be $20. Beers would be $4. Tickets purchased at Walmart would have no extra fees.
As Rock hits DTE Energy Music Theatre Friday night to begin an eight-show stand — a record run boosted by the cheap tickets — it’s clear his summer adventure has the close attention of an industry looking for lessons.
“That’s what has been missing in the modern concert business, at the top level, anyway — the ability to experiment,” said Gary Bongiovanni, editor of the trade magazine Pollstar.
Rock’s camp, meantime, is already proclaiming it a grand slam. In most markets, his show attendance is up substantially from 2011, in some cases threefold, said Rock’s manager, Lee Trink. The remaining six weeks of shows, with opener ZZ Top, are nearly sold out.  http://www.freep.com/article/20130808/ENT/308080187/Kid-Rock-s-gamble-on-cheap-tickets-wakes-up-concert-industry
It would be nice to have Kid Rock's pricing in Las Vegas where the price of tickets are usually out of reach for the middle class and below.
Fleetwood Mac and Jimmy Buffet are going to play at the MGM and their tickets run from about $100 to $211 per ticket plus the usual ticket fees and taxes.  Donny and Marie Osmond, at the Flamingo, tickets are $127 on down.
Even the lower end shows usually run about $60-80.
So, good luck to Kid Rock with his ticket pricing and let's hope some shows in Las Vegas get the idea as well.

No comments:

Post a Comment