How to buy the best tickets before everyone else!

Posted At : March 14, 2008 4:10 PM | Posted By : Andrew Strempler
Related Categories: Front of the Line

I am sure that most of you have heard about pre-sales of concert tickets and have often been frustrated because by the time you go to the ticket office, most of the best tickets are gone! The problem is that you really need to know the "system" to get great seats to concerts and events. I am going to share with you what i have experienced as both a promoter (bringing in Kanye West to Winnipeg) and as a ticket buyer.

First of all, every concert is different. Depending on who is promoting the concert (Live Nation) and which radio or print sponsors are advertising the shows, there are different techniques to getting these tickets.

#1. Understand which bands are coming to your city BEFORE they are announced in the papers (we will create a forum for this)

#2. Obtain an AMEX card - you need it for a large portion of concerts (get it through one of the links on this page to support us)

#3. Get used to buying these tickets ONLINE. Although the fees are sometimes higher online, this is the only way to buy pre-sale

#4. Become a member of EVERY major radio station's membership (emails) as they often give out pre-sale codes

#5. Become a member of your major newspaper (Winnipeg Free Press "Press Card" in Winnipeg) email programs. Subscribe to these things.

If you aren't comfortable subscribing to these, i will try to post all the pre-sale codes that i can get for you to review on the site.

After you have done all these things, you need to go to ticketmaster.ca at the exact time the tickets become available (usually 10AM).

If there is a Live Nation presale and you don't know the code, try ROCK, SONG or MUSIC (80% of their shows in Canada).

There is a lot of trickery in this business. Often, you are forced to purchase memberships to fan clubs (Mellencamp and others). Also, they will run live auctions or ticket exchanges at higher costs. Sometimes the memberships are then included in your ticket price at this point.

Sometimes the pre-sale tickets are really BAD. If this is the case, don't be fooled into buying them. Log onto ticketmaster.ca right when the tickets go to public sale, they also release a bunch of good ones at that time.

If all this fails, just check online OFTEN. It is VERY common that on the day of the event at around 1 or 2 PM, they release 20 to 40 really good tickets that were reserved for friends of the band.

I know that this is a lot of information, and I will try to give inside information on events for you to make things easier.

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hey,
The online presale had crap tickets and when they finally went on ticketmaster.ca at 10AM the tickets i wanted sold out very quickly. There were only far away spots. The auction tickets are like $400 and thats ridiculous. I REALLY want kanye tickets. Do you think i have any other options or is it too late?
# Posted By Lucie | 3/28/08 6:28 PM
That happens sometimes. In what city did you try to buy the tickets? Calgary was really tough for Kanye West tickets.

If you can't get tickets any more and it seems completely sold out, you may want to take a shot at getting the tickets the day of the event sometime between 1PM and 3PM, they will likely release a bunch of prime seats.

Also watch Kijiji.com in your city. Sometimes people get them and just sell them at face value. Sometimes people get them at work or elsewhere so there may be some floating around.
# Posted By andrew | 3/28/08 8:35 PM
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