Sundance, Scalping and You

I appreciate your purpose in opposing online ticket scalping but I think your attack on the Utah resident program ignores many serious realities for us, the Utah residents.
First off, Sundance takes huge amounts of money in the form of grants, tax incentives and other handouts from the Utah State government and most recently Sundance took $50,000 from Summit Count. Summit County is not LA county and $50,000 is a lot of money from a county with a population under 100,000 people.
Second, Sundance invades Park City and turns our lives upside down. Traffic congestion, parking issues and long lines at Albertsons are all things we dont usually deal with in Park City and dont get me started on putting up some of the LA asshats I encounter.
Finally, a majority of Utah residents actually choose to go to the movies. Mr. Dimwitt with his tickets on Ebay should not be treated as the norm. Also I should mention that plenty of non-Utah Residents buy tickets online and resell them.
The Utah resident program is one of the few things Sundance does for residents to say, "Thanks for letting us take over your town."
I think there are a few ways to fix the problem including:
1. Sundance could find out the people who are reselling tickets and blacklist them from future ticket sales.
2. The distribution of locals tickets could be restricted to those who are residents of the county where the film is playing or something similar.
3. People could not buy the tix online. Remeber unused seats at Sundance are sold to people inline. Unlike a rock concert where the seat will go unfilled. This would also stick the scalper with the loss.


Thanks for the post though and raising the issue of scalpers at Sundance.

Reply

Nitka, great post in defense of Utah residents. I believe that Sundance is already banning people found to be reselling tickets online, forever. Giving back to the community is an important thing and the community itself should help to curb those few taking advantage of the system. As Erik said, paying $300+ for tickets is stupid anyways when the film is being released three weeks later so maybe someone should be taking their money.

Reply

I was at a Little Miss Sunshine screening last year, and I overheard some folks thinking about dropping 50 bucks apiece for two tickets.

Then I went to see The Darwin Awards, and a friend said he watched someone buy two tickets from a scalper for $130. Funny thing is, The Darwin Awards is barely worthy of a $3 rental fee. ;)

As far as the comparison between a concert and a movie, a concert is kind of a one-time-only event, whereas any half-decent Sundance flick will be readily available within the next 3 to 8 months. Spending that sort of cash on a movie ticket seems pretty ridiculous to me.

Reply

Think about it the opposite way (like any economist would). If I go to see Year of the Dog this year and don't sell my tickets, I am paying $300 in opportunity cost. I am the sucker for not selling. Obviously I could see that movie in a few months. Also the Q/A at Eccles always sucks.

The Q/A at Little Miss S last year was so good. I would have easily paid $50 a ticket for that had I known it would be that good.

Reselling tickets hurts no-one. In fact it actually helps. If you really want/need a ticket just pay market price.

Sundance is the one at fault here. Instead of complaining / illegally deactivating tickets, Sundance should just significantly raise their ticket prices. $15 is a joke. $40 would be more in line with reality, but still probably low. If tickets sell out in minutes, your prices are significantly too low.

Reply

I completely disagree with the previous post. I've never been one to whine about the purity of the festival (because lets face it, Sundance lost its innocence a long time ago), but scalpers make it significantly more difficult for the majority of people to go see films. They take away the number of tickets available at standard price.

Personally, I can't afford to be paying upwards of $500 for a pair of tickets to an indie film that could very well suck. Raising the price of tickets to $40 would be ridiculous. I am all for supporting independent cinema, but I'm not going to pay more than five times the price of a regular movie ticket. It makes Sundance even more elitist than it already is because it comes down to who has enough money to support the struggling independent filmmakers.

As far as scalpers, I really don't care about their opportunity cost. They didn't put any money into making the film, essentially they're a third party freeloader. Considering how much pain it takes to get an indie film made, I don't really think they deserve to benefit from the movie. If you buy tickets for the expressed purpose of profit from reselling and you don't sell them, I don't feel sorry for you. If the worse case scenario is that you end up seeing the movie that everyone else is trying to see, what's the problem?

Reply

Erik, Just to clarify:

"See, each year a select amount of Sundance tickets are given out to local folks prior to them going on sale to the general public."

None of the tickets for Sundance are given out for free to the local folks prior to them going out to the general public. Each of my 20 tickets cost $15.00. And, yes, this was the weekend before the sale to the general public. There are, however, tickets given out for two movies shown the Monday night after the festival each year, as an appreciation gesture to the community. These are the award winners for the dramatic and documentary competitions. They are not for sale to anyone as they are distributed free on a first-come, first-served basis.

Nitka!, This year Sundance addressed:

"2. The distribution of locals tickets could be restricted to those who are residents of the county where the film is playing or something similar."

On this year's Local's Individual ticket sales weekend email, mine included this:

* Purchase times at the Park City Main Box Office will be reserved for the residents of Summit County who live in zip codes: 84017, 84024, 84033, 84036, 84055, 84060, 84061, 84068, 84098 (valid Utah Driver's License or photo ID and a Utah utility bill required to prove residency).

* If you register for the Summit County Locals time slots, but cannot show proof of residency in the valid zip codes, you will not be allowed to buy tickets during Locals Weekend in Park City. Another time slot in Salt Lake City will not be provided.

As far as reselling tickets online, my email also included this:

* Sundance reserves the right to prohibit any future sales during this festival and in future years to any ticket buyer who is identified as an online auction ticket reseller. Ticket stubs will be scanned at the door at selected theatres this year. Re-sold tickets could be deactivated remotely prior to arrival.

I'm not so sure they'll track everyone down, but as least the threat is there. I can tell you though, that there are always people selling tickets in front of the theaters before the movies. Most just sell them at face value, but some also scalp them. When I can't make a movie I sell my tickets at face value to the seemingly least-obnoxious person in line at that theater. They're happy, I got my $$ back and all is well. I won't pay more than face value, because as many said already, most movies are in wide release or on DVD soon enough.

kinggofg, $40.??? Not for Sundance movies...this isn't NYC or LA.

Reply

You asked for input from veterans, and I have to tell you that you are way off base with your take on who is selling their tickets. I live in Salt Lake and have been attending the festival for many years, sometimes buying tickets from those who resell them. EVERY time I've done this I've been asked to pick them up at the seller's hotel in Park City (i.e., these are visiting people with huge ticket packages who just didn't want to attend that particular show, not Utah locals who purchased the tickets for the purpose of reselling them). I've never encountered a peson reselling tickets who resembles the "Don Dumwit from Ogden" of your scenario. I have always encountered out-of-state people selling tickets that they simply aren't going to use. This has enabled locals who are interested in seeing these films to actually get tickets. You ask if seeing these films is really worth paying a marked-up price. My answer is that it is much easier to pay $50 for a resold ticket (your $300 example is extreme) than to camp out overnight on a sidewalk prior to the tickets going on sale in an attempt to buy individual tickets to the better films, or spending staggering amounts of money on big ticket packages. This move reduces, rather than increases, the availability of tickets to ordinary people. This seems aimed at preventing local people from crashing the party and nothing more.

Reply

Scalping hurts the local economy, channeling funds away from local infrastructure spending. If I lived in Utah, I'd be pissed to have to endure the festival knowing full well how much cash was being handed to scalpers.

The festival could stop scalping dead in its tracks if it truly wanted to without trying to play police on ebay, etc.

Technology exists to shut scalping down very easily.

We reviewed technology that does this on our site. TicketLife.com

Reply