With The Summer Event Season ‘Roaring,’ Consumers See Ticket Prices Soaring 

Consumers are getting back in the live-event saddle again. As Live Nation announced Q2 earnings this week, the firm touted that its Ticketmaster just had one of its best months ever in North America, as consumers are heading back out for in-person events.

But the pick-up wasn’t quite enough to pull Live Nation out of the woods: The firm reported that its net loss has not yet disappeared, but has narrowed to $195.7 million from $587.5 million at this time last year. And revenue is way up, increasing 677 percent year on year to $575.9 million.

“The momentum for the return to live events has been building every month, with ticket sales and concert attendance pacing faster than expected, underscoring the strength and resiliency of the concert business and live events in general,” Live Nation CEO Michael Rapino said during the company’s earnings call on Tuesday (Aug. 3).

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The most drastic upswing was logged in June, Rapino noted, as the number of concerts available for ticket purchase skyrocketed. All in, the company expects to see more than three million fans attending concerts and festivals in the second half of the year, a roughly two-thirds increase over the same time period in 2019.

The return of consumers to live events is encouraging news, particularly because it is happening faster than expected, according to Live Nation. But the results are also another indication that the cost of going out is going up — both in terms of how much consumers are spending while they are out, and what it is costing to get there.

The Summer Of The More Expensive Event 

According to Live Nation, the market is seeing pent-up demand as consumers are hungry to connect in person — both to each other and to their favorite artists.

“And momentum for the return of live shows has been building every month, with ticket sales and concert attendance pacing faster than expected, underscoring the strength and resilience of the concert business and live events in general,” Rapino said.

That strength and resilience has created a situation where Live Nation is well ahead of where it expected to be as of Q2, and on the ramp to acceleration in the second half of 2021 and full recovery as of 2022.

But also notable in Live Nation’s earnings report is the evidence of increased consumer spending. Major festivals sold out in record time, and “[for] amphitheater shows over the past few weeks, we have delivered strong double-digit increases in average per-fan revenue and on-site spending versus 2019,” the company said. Most interestingly, ticket prices are up by 10 percent over 2019 levels.

A Starting Trend

Concerts aren’t the only form of in-person entertainment seeing sharp price increases. Reigning ruler of the theme park space Disney has been raising its prices all summer via a host of tactics. The annual pass program at California’s Disneyland park was discontinued in January and will be replaced at the end of this month with the upgraded — and now more expensive — Magic Key program. Gate prices at Disney World in Florida are also up 7 percent over 2019 levels; a single-day ticket to the parks is now $134.

Read more: Disneyland Swaps Annual Passes For ‘Superfan’ Memberships

But Disney’s bigger pricing moves are abroad, with park tickets at their Shanghai location set to increase by 10 percent. Disney is also using its Paris park to experiment with tiered pricing, allowing consumers to purchase premium-access passes costing between 8 and 15 euros that allow impatient guests to skip lines for rides entirely. And if it works in Europe, don’t be surprised to see it supplant the current (free) Fast Pass offering.

Consumers’ rush back to live events and in-person activities shouldn’t come as much of a shock. As PYMNTS data from late spring demonstrated, consumers were clear about their reasons for wanting to get back to the outside world: seeing family and friends again and going to live events were near the top of the post-vaccination to-do list.

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What is becoming clear, however, is that the in-person providers of entertainment and other events are aware of the pent-up demand — and are comfortable charging consumers a premium to access it.