Viagogo on Open Distribution: “We’re trying to really open ticketing up”
"What we're doing is bringing the power back to the fans."
As StubHub and viiagogo continue to evolve, two of the ticketing giant’s leading figures have told Rolling Stone UK why they’ve launched a new model: Open Distribution.
The new model is a non-exclusive, no-added-cost way for artists, teams, and venues to sell official tickets directly to fans across a global marketplace.
“To understand how this works, we like the comparison of how this works for airlines,” says Chief Business Officer Raj Beri.
“In the travel industry they built global distribution systems so that any travel agent in the world could access and book flight tickets for any customer they’re interacting with. The travel agent in Tokyo didn’t have a direct relationship with British Airways, they just had access through a global distribution system to book tickets for those customers.”
Until now, that global distribution system simply didn’t exist in the ticketing world.
“When Ticketmaster was founded in the 1970s, it operated on a very different strategy which is venues essentially outsourcing their ticketing to a third party,” explains Beri.
“Their distribution was owned by Ticketmaster, and Ticketmaster largely in that primary model just had an exclusive path to market. But over time, there’s more than just one primary now around the world and what we’ve found is we can directly interface with these primaries and give the rights holders the ability to globally distribute their tickets beyond just their primary channel.”
This now means that StubHub, in North America, and viagogo, its international brand, have been able to team up with Manchester City, Alpine Formula One Team andor the New York Yankees to expand their reach beyond just a single primary system, putting tickets in front of the fans everywhere.
“That’s why it’s very strong for the venue, the artist, the team, and the promoter. It’s a seismic shift in how they’ve sold and distributed inventory,” adds Beri.
“But what we’re more excited about is the impact on the fan, which is instead of having to shop on multiple different platforms searching around, looking for inventory and the best price, you can come to a single place via viagogo or StubHub and find the primary inventory – an example being our official Alpine Formula One Team tickets which you could browse alongside many other options from resellers.
VP of Open Distribution, Shaun Stewart, adds: “What we’re doing is bringing the power back to the fans, so with a single search experience, they can see all the options. And when you have the primary tickets plus secondary fans tickets and the intermediaries, that’s gonna allow them to have access to the most competitive price.”
They also say that despite some industry giants showing resistance, new partners are being added all the time.
“If you’re the other 55 primaries that operate in Europe, this is an incredibly positive thing for them and allows them to offer teams and venues a functionality and distribution capability that the big 800 pound gorilla doesn’t have. So the industry is aligned here,” says Stewuart.
“We are integrating a new primary every other week because they see the benefit.”
Raj Beri said viagogo’s policy would lead to fairer pricing and “be better for fans”.
He said: “We’re looking to really expand in the UK. We believe resale is very important. But we also believe open distribution is the future of ticketing, and that’s going to be the huge growth driver in the market.”
This year, the UK Government proposed a new law to make it illegal to resell tickets for live events above original cost. Though positioned as a solution to help fix the ticketing industry, the pair argue that instead it’ll cause fans to be pushed to purchase tickets on unregulated and unsafe parts of the internet and will increase the Ticketmaster monopoly.
Since 2005, primary ticket prices in the UK have increased by 280%. Primary ticketing makes up 94% of the UK ticketing market whereas resale accounts for just 6%. The UK government’s proposal for price caps won’t fix pricing for fans because it will reduce competition and strengthen Ticketmaster ‘s monopoly in the UK leaving fans with fewer safe alternatives.
In other markets where price caps exist, fans are left with one dominant primary platform. The lack of competition in markets such as Ireland where price caps exist has led to four times more ticket fraud than in the UK and higher ticket prices because there is one company controlling the supply and setting the prices making Ireland among the most expensive places to buy tickets in Europe.
“Through Open Distribution, we’re really trying to open ticketing up and make it better for fans and the industry,” says Beri. You can find out more here.