Have you ever sat there anxiously at ten in the morning hitting refresh on your computer screen over and over again waiting for tickets to your favorite band to go on sale, then you know the stomach sinking feeling of finally getting through to the event page and seeing that every single ticket is already gone. And just to put salt in the wound, you head over to Stubhub two minutes later and see that lo and behold, the tickets you seek are sitting right there... only now they're five times what they should cost.
How did this happen?
It's not because there's thousands of people out there with freakishly strong pointer fingers that can hit refresh a millisecond faster than you. It's not because you're unlucky. It's because there's a league of scalpers out there who have spent thousands of dollars on bots to get ahold of as many tickets as they can before you even get a chance. What's worse? Sometimes they don't even need bots because companies like Ticketmaster just give them the keys to their own backdoor.
We've all been sold out. And when it comes to buying tickets on the primary market, the deck is stacked against us, the true fans who just want to support their favorite artists.
Studies have shown that for high demand events, 4 out of every 5 tickets will end up on the secondary market and then resold to true fans for 2x, 3x, sometimes as much as 10x their original value. This isn't just a coincidence, it's an epidemic.
If you look out on the landscape of ticketing platforms out there, virtually none of them are trying to solve this problem. In fact, they're doing the opposite. They're actively making it easier for scalpers to rip you off.
Enter Sellout.
We're here to eliminate ticket scalping. But that's not all. We built this company on the belief that good human values still matter in this industry. We focus on delivering better and better customer experiences year over year before you ever worry about delivering dividends to your shareholders. And most importantly, we never take advantage of fans simply because they're emotionally invested in their favorite artists and will pay whatever it takes to see them. It might be "good economics" but it's not what's best for you. We're here to have your back.
And since we've entered this business we realize that there are many more ways than just eliminating scalping to create a higher standard of ticketing. From high fees to poorly designed apps, there's a lot of improvements to be made. And we're hellbent on making them, and bringing them all to market quickly so that fans, performers, and event organizers alike can all benefit together.
The only ones we're leaving behind? Scalpers 👋