Ludacris tickets sell out in minutes
Updated April 15 at 11:51 p.m.
Tickets to see rapper Ludacris on April 24 sold out within 40 minutes of going on sale at the Norris Box Office’s Web site on Wednesday.
Users began to see “sold out” messages on the site within a few minutes after the tickets went on sale at 10 a.m.
According to A&O Productions Promotions and Public Relations Co-Chair Barry McCardel, some transactions did not go through, so some tickets went back on sale after being held online for about 15 minutes. He said tickets did not officially sell out until 10:39 a.m, and by that point A&O had sold over 1000 tickets.
If possible, McCardel said, A&O plans to sell an additional number of tickets at a later date. The group is working on a number of factors such as risk management to get a finalized capacity of Patten Gymnasium for the event. “We’re always working to get as many tickets out to the community as we can,” he said.
He noted that more information will be released on A&O’s Web site.
This is the second time A&O Productions has made use of online ticketing, after using it to sell Demetri Martin tickets, which also sold out within an hour. According to McCardel, the online ticketing system has been met with a positive response. “The vast majority of students seem to have a great experience with it,” the Communication sophomore said. “They’re able to buy tickets to shows like this from dorm rooms.” He added that if students have encountered legitimate ticketing errors, they should contact the Norris Box Office.
“We’re always thrilled when we’re able to book a show like this, but just as disappointed when students can’t get tickets,” he said, noting tickets probably would have sold out quickly whether they were sold physically or online. He said A&O has plans to continue to use the online system for future events.
But many students were not only disappointed when Ludacris concert tickets sold out within minutes, but were left frustrated with the online ticketing.
“At 10:03 I logged on to the A&O site to buy the tickets and then it was taking a very long time,” said SESP freshman Ally Supowitz, a first-time user of the site. “By the time it connected me, it was 10:05 and they had sold out and I refreshed it several times and I still did not have tickets.”
Despite not being able to get a ticket, Supowitz is hopeful that A&O releases more tickets. According to its Web site as of Wednesday evening, A&O is “working to secure a limited number of additional tickets to go on sale at a later date.”
McCormick freshman Sam Schwartz, also a first time user, was able to purchase one ticket out of the two that A&O allots per WildCARD.
“I kept refreshing the page from like, 10:10 to 10:20 with hopes that the tickets would become available,” Schwartz said. “So sometime around 10:21, 10:22, it said that there were tickets available so I ran through the process and it would only let me check out one ticket.”
However, out of the approximately 10 people with Schwartz, he said only about four people ended up successfully purchasing tickets. The site was frustratingly slow and A&O should have expanded its server in preparation for the high traffic, Schwartz said.
“A lot of people are dissatisfied with how it worked out,” Schwartz said.
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selling out tickets in minutes is garbage, get a proper venue, you can only make more money there’s no point in not letting people in
anon
April 15, 2009 at 12:49 pm
“Get a proper venue”!? Like that’s really A&O’s decision? Where would you like them to have concerts on campus?
LOL
April 15, 2009 at 1:38 pm
They had Kanye West in Welsh Ryan, and I waited in line for that show bright and early!
René Jovel aka SupaKat
April 15, 2009 at 4:19 pm
Welsh-Ryan costs $25,000 to rent for concerts. A&O is rarely able to afford this cost, and was only able to afford holding Kanye West there by using years worth of their own private funds.
FYI
April 15, 2009 at 8:20 pm
They should bring back in person ticket sales. Lines make sure that the people who want the tickets the most (those who wait outside at 630 in the morning like I did for Flight of the Conchords) get tickets. Online sales allow people with a marginal interest to buy tickets before people with a greater interest. So long as the venue problem persists, I think this is the fairest method.
gR
April 16, 2009 at 12:38 am
I know that Welsh-Ryan is expensive, I was merely answering the question about venues on campus.
René Jovel aka SupaKat
April 16, 2009 at 1:42 am
People are just upset they didn’t get tickets! Too bad, I got mine! This noob girl said she logged in at 10:03? Of course they’re gonna be sold out! TOO LATE GURLFRAN. I copped mine at 10:00:00 am sharp. YOU ALREADY KNOW!
YOU MADDD
April 16, 2009 at 1:43 am
It’s nice that you think that gR. Sadly, that doesn’t make you right.
sigh
April 16, 2009 at 8:18 am
gR,
You have a valid point, but part of A&O’s mission is to make access to these events as convenient as possible. For them to choose one ticketing method over another just to impose an arbitrary difficulty-barrier for getting tickets is moving away from that goal. Who is A&O to judge who deserves a ticket more than another? We all pay the SAF.
Ludacris
April 16, 2009 at 1:40 pm
If you’re doing it online you should at least make sure the server can handle the traffic. I ended up getting tickets but only after having to refresh about 15 times after getting the tickets in my shopping cart. I’m sure a lot of people weren’t so lucky with the technical difficulties.
But....
April 16, 2009 at 5:17 pm
A&O does not control that server. If you look at the name of the site, it is the Norris Box Office. I’m sure that some A&O members will look into speaking with Norris about improving their service, but ya can’t really blame A&O for using a Norris provided service, especially since this is the first time there have been bandwidth issues on the server. If this happens continually in the future, then A&O may be at fault for not realizing that this is a serious problem.
Bilbo Baggins
April 16, 2009 at 10:13 pm
tl;dr
Anon
April 17, 2009 at 9:59 pm