The Price of Music: The Oasis debacle and what Ticketmaster’s “dynamic pricing” means for the future
Over the weekend, many music fans were left reeling as they scrambled and failed to get their hands on tickets for the 2025 Oasis reunion shows. While droves were left rueing what could have been, the main takeaway from the weekend was just how appalling Ticketmaster’s “dynamic pricing” model is for the consumer. The tickets, which were promised to be set at certain prices by the band, shot up to eye-watering levels.
This furore has commenced a broader cultural discussion about Ticketmaster’s monopoly, with British politicians weighing in on their often-murky practices. This follows on from the highly publicised US Senate Committee hearing about such operations in 2023. Given such a widespread outcry, it looks like Ticketmaster’s place at the top of the pile, which once seemed absolute, might well be starting to shake, as the masses on both sides of the Atlantic feel their sting.
There have been numerous occasions in which Ticketmaster has faced criticism for its methods, with several high-profile musicians accusing the company of employing underhand tactics to tighten its grip on the market. Reflecting this shift in public opinion that now seems to be occurring, in May 2024, it was reported that the United States Department of Justice is set to file a lawsuit against Ticketmaster’s parent company Live Nation Entertainment for monopolisation in the industry.
Live Nation Entertainment is a leviathan in the live entertainment industry. It produces over 20,000 shows annually for more than 2,000 artists globally. Their scope is so extensive that the company also operates in artist management alongside ticketing.
What is Ticketmaster’s “dynamic pricing”?
Ticketmaster’s “dynamic pricing” has been operational since at least 2018, and it is a concept that we’re all very familiar with. Think of Uber’s “surge pricing”, or when the prices of plane tickets rise exponentially when the demand is high. Here you have what Ticketmaster dubs “dynamic pricing”. Simply put; when the demand for tickets is higher, so are the prices. This raises Ticketmaster’s market share and value, and whilst making more money for the artist and venue due to pre-existing contracts, it also leaves the audience’s wallet empty. Just ask Taylor Swift fans, Oasis heads or anyone who’s been to see a high-profile act at a stadium recently.
As highlighted by InsideHook in 2021, at that point, the most famous instance of fans falling foul of Ticketmaster’s “dynamic pricing” was in 2018 when Taylor Swift followers were surprised to find that the only way they could purchase tickets for her Reputation tour was to agree to the “outrageous” prices that Ticketmaster was dictating for them, as Swift had partnered exclusively with the marketplace for the tour.
“If you went on Ticketmaster in January and pulled up a third-row seat for Taylor Swift’s June 2nd show at Chicago’s Soldier Field, it would have cost you $995,” Rolling Stone reported following the outcry. “But if you looked up the same seat three months later, the price would have been $595. That’s because Swift has adopted ‘dynamic pricing,’ where concert tickets — like airline seats — shift prices constantly in adjusting to market demand. It’s a move intended to squeeze out the secondary-ticket market — but it’s also left many fans confused as they’re asked to pay hundreds of dollars more than face value.”
Ironically, fans once again experienced the harsh side of the practice when trying to secure tickets for the highest-grossing tour of all time, Swift’s Eras Tour. Yet, we get the feeling that Oasis fans who have been wanting to see their favourite band for nearly 15 years, are far more dangerous to Ticketmaster’s operation than the Swifties, who will stop at nothing to watch her live.
How did “dynamic pricing” affect the Oasis ticket sales?
Despite Oasis making a relatively big song and dance about the prices for their shows, on Saturday morning after the tickets went on sale, on Ticketmaster – one of three outlets selling them including Gigs and Tours and See Tickets – the prices rose in line the eye-watering demand. It saw some tickets rise to far above £350, thus dwarfing the original price of roughly £150 for the standing section that they were originally sat at. While the prices depending on the venue varied for standing and seating, all rose due to the demand, stripping many fans of their dreams due to their cost.
Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy has now had her say, asserting that she wants to finish “rip-off resales” for good, and ensure that gig tickets are sold at “fair prices”. Nandy expressed that it is “depressing to see vastly inflated prices excluding ordinary fans” from gigs. An autumn consultation into ticket resale websites had already been announced by the government, with fans also falling foul of high resale prices for Oasis tickets, but after this high-profile debacle, the government has now confirmed it will be investigating “dynamic pricing”.
Nandy has said that ministers would explore “issues around the transparency and use of dynamic pricing, including the technology around queuing systems which incentivise it”.
Ticketmaster has maintained it does not set prices and that it is down to the “event organiser” who “has priced these tickets according to their market value”. If true, this brings into serious question Oasis’ motivations for the reunion, and their supposedly working-class spirit, as clearly no care has been given to their fans, many of whom hail from the same roots that they grew up in.
Why does Ticketmaster use “dynamic pricing”?
For anyone who has followed Ticketmaster’s practices for a lengthy period, the adoption of “dynamic pricing” is a means of squeezing the secondary market because the company sees scalpers as their most potent existential threat, wanting to consolidate their power. However, regardless of how shadowy the secondary ticket market can be, with its widespread rent-seeking practices, it’s never going to be enough to topple the monopoly that Ticketmaster has due to the long-standing influence the company has secured with artists and venues.
For years, and before the 2010 merger with Live Nation Entertainment, the company has pitted itself against the secondary market, seemingly in a bid to whitewash its image, wanting to neutralise the negative press it’s received for its anti-competition practices. Herein lies the crux of the problem. For Ticketmaster, a lot of it is about anti-competition, to the point that its struggle to dominate the highest possible percentage of the global ticketing market threatens to be the thing that pulls the rug from under them. This is what we are now seeing the first tentative signs of.
However, despite the shift in public opinion, it doesn’t look like any significant change will occur overnight, considering that the industry is still attempting to recover from the pandemic and the fact that, for venues and the most prominent artists, Ticketmaster remains a fruitful relationship that works, lining their coffers at the expense of the rest of us.
Setting up a functioning website that doesn’t crash when on-demand tickets are placed on site, having a network to validate tickets, and a customer service wing are highly expensive for venues and not worth the investment during this economic climate, is what we’ve been told, despite Ticketmaster’s website buckling under the pressure at the weekend. Of course, some venues also do their own ticketing, but often it’s for no tangible financial gain.
We have to remember that Ticketmaster is essentially a middleman between the artist and their fans. It’s the artist and their team who set the value of tickets in each section for the venue, and Ticketmaster adds fees on top for the use of their platform. As has frequently been pointed out, in the agreement between Ticketmaster and an artist, the act is given a choice on how much of the marketplace’s fees they want to pay for and how much they elect to pass on to the consumer, and clearly, they often pass this on to the fan. Therefore, the Gallaghers are on the brink of forgoing their position as public heroes forever.
After all, there is something inherently exploitative about dynamic pricing being enacted on such a sought-after show. After hours of waiting in a very predictable queue, many fans will feel that they were, in essence, bent over a barrel when they suddenly found the price was far higher than expected. In that moment, it comes down to paying up to the demands or passing up the chance you’ve waited hours for to the next person in the line.
Ticketmaster offers an easy service for venues and artists, and with their long-standing connections, it’s a relationship that works for all parties bar the consumer. There’s a reason that more artists don’t stand up to Ticketmaster; it’s a marriage of convenience, and with the concept of dynamic pricing, it only looks to be a relationship that becomes more profitable.
What is the future of Ticketmaster’s “dynamic pricing”?
Shockingly, Schellion Horn, competition economist at accountancy firm Grant Thornton told the BBC’s Today programme that “dynamic pricing” is about setting the price of supply and demand. She suggested that over the weekend there was a “realisation that actually the tickets were underpriced” when the sales started on Saturday, given just how many people had queued online. She asserted that fans were “clearly willing to pay prices of £300-400” or they wouldn’t have spent it. Horn also claimed the underlying issue is one of a lack of transparency as most people were not aware that “dynamic pricing” was in operation.
So what does Ticketmaster’s dynamic pricing mean for music? Well, right now, not much. In terms of the market shifting out of Ticketmaster’s hands, the consumer needs the biggest artists in the world to speak out — and in favour of other platforms. However, like with the economic system that this debate is a product of, this is the status quo, and until there’s a total overhaul, not much will change.
Ticketmaster might well stop this practice if people were to boycott their service, but this would have a negative knock-on effect on artists as well as their fans, with musicians losing out on their main point of income and fans not watching their favourites live. As this seems unlikely, government intervention could also stop it, but right now we’re unsure of what will pan out on this front.
Ultimately, as they did this past weekend, fans need to call out this practice in the hope of getting the most famous artists whose live tours are worth the most to rethink their partnerships with Ticketmaster, as they’re the ones who determine the real price we pay. We need to force the middleman out and bring down “dynamic” ticket pricing. Alas, with the tour still selling out with ease, and the clamour for tickets still ongoing even after the fact, that looks unlikely. As for the artists, thus far only The Cure have made any real prominent stance when it comes to mainstream names.
This is just one front in what is shaping up to be a battle between artists and their fans, as they grapple with a dwindling market due to the loss of revenue from streaming and look to the live circuit as the last way of making any genuinely big money. It’s moments like this where the future of music looks incredibly bleak, particularly given that none of this circles back to the beleaguered grassroots realm either.
