Leadership / 08.20.18

Ed Sheeran to Hammer Ticket Touts With New Strategy for Concerts That Will Put Real Fans First

Access Staff

Original article published on Daily Record (UK) (08/20/18) by Mark McGivern

Pop musician Ed Sheeran is combating scalping by having a team of monitors invalidate scalped tickets and help fans get into concerts at face-value prices after being cheated by scalpers on Viagogo. "I like to think what we're doing is like a big cannonball running down a tunnel," says Sheeran's manager, Stuart Camp. "The touts are running ahead like Indiana Jones and sooner or later it's going to catch them up and squash them." Camp says the fight against scalpers has been ramped up during Sheeran's U.K. tour, where a mobile "Victim of Viagogo" counter has visited each venue and cancelled invalid scalped tickets. Sheeran's tour is notable for how the artist's terms and conditions deterred three of the big four sites from listing briefs for resale, with only Viagogo ignoring the rules. According to Camp, managers, promoters and ticket agents are generally confident that the fight against scalpers has been bolstered by Ticketmaster's recent decision to terminate its Get Me In! and Seatwave resale sites. However, he stresses that the vending giant must be steadfast in its promise to use technology to prevent ticket sales on Viagogo and StubHub.

Read the full story on the Daily Record (UK) website.

Tags: Music , Reselling , News , Secondary Ticketing