Ticketmaster has dominated the primary ticket sales market in the United States and Canada for decades. With exclusive ticket sales agreements in place with many major venues and promoters, Ticketmaster sells tickets for the vast majority of major concerts and sporting events. This has led many consumers to believe that Ticketmaster has no serious competitors in the primary ticket sales business.
However, while Ticketmaster is clearly the dominant player, there are some other options available for primary event ticket sales. Though they have a far smaller market share than Ticketmaster, companies like AXS, Altitude Tickets, Tickets.com and Ticketfly do provide primary ticketing services for some venues and events.
AXS
AXS is owned by entertainment giant AEG and serves as the official ticketing provider for AEG venues around the world. These venues include major arenas like Los Angeles’ Staples Center and London’s O2 Arena. AXS sells tickets as the primary ticket agent for events at AEG operated venues.
In addition to having an exclusive ticket sales agreement with AEG, AXS has deals in place with other venues, sports teams, and event promoters. As a result, they sell primary tickets for selected events at venues like San Francisco’s Chase Center, Denver’s Empower Field at Mile High, and the Chicago Bears’ Soldier Field. Still, AXS has nowhere close to the number of exclusive agreements and market share that Ticketmaster has.
Altitude Tickets
Altitude Tickets is the primary ticketing service for the Pepsi Center, Paramount Theatre, Broomfield Event Center, FirstBank Center and Dick’s Sporting Goods Park in metropolitan Denver. While they have a significant presence in the Denver area, Altitude Tickets’ market outside of Colorado is very small.
Tickets.com
Tickets.com serves as the primary ticket provider for a limited number of venues and teams. These include the University of Texas Longhorn sports teams, select minor league baseball teams, and a small number of venues like the Rose Bowl Stadium in Pasadena. Overall, their market share pales in comparison to Ticketmaster.
Ticketfly
Ticketfly provides primary ticketing services for some small music venues and clubs, particularly in the United States’ eastern major cities. However, since being acquired by Eventbrite in 2017, Ticketfly’s market share in primary ticket sales appears to have shrunk further.
Market Share
While Ticketmaster’s competitors in the primary ticket sales market may have high visibility in certain cities and venues, their overall market share is tiny compared to Ticketmaster and AEG/AXS. According to a 2020 Government Accountability Office (GAO) study, Ticketmaster’s share of the primary ticket sales market is 80-90%. AXS is a very distant second with around 5%. No other primary ticket seller has more than 1% market share.
| Company | Estimated Market Share |
|---|---|
| Ticketmaster | 80-90% |
| AXS | 5% |
| Altitude Tickets | <1% |
| Tickets.com | <1% |
| Ticketfly | <1% |
Reasons for Ticketmaster’s Market Dominance
There are several key reasons Ticketmaster has such an overwhelmingly dominant position in primary event ticketing:
Exclusive agreements
Ticketmaster frequently signs long-term exclusive deals to be the official primary ticketing provider for major venues, sports leagues/teams, and promoters. This locks out competitors and makes Ticketmaster the only place to purchase tickets directly from the source. They have exclusive ticketing deals with hundreds of major venues and organizations including:
- All NFL Teams
- All NBA Teams except the Dallas Mavericks
- Over 80 major stadiums and arenas
- Most major concert promoters like LiveNation and AEG
- Many performing arts centers and theaters
These exclusive deals make it incredibly hard for any competitors to gain market share. The lockout extends to the secondary market too. Ticket resale sites like Stubhub often have to receive inventory indirectly as they are blocked from primary integrations.
Industry consolidation
There has been significant consolidation in the live entertainment and ticketing industries over the past 15 years. As part of this, Ticketmaster has either acquired or entered into major partnerships with companies that previously competed with them.
Most notably, Ticketmaster merged with LiveNation, the world’s largest concert promoter, in 2010. This created a vertically integrated company that promotes shows, owns ticket inventory, and does primary and secondary sales. LiveNation venues and events are now exclusive to Ticketmaster ticketing.
Other industry players like AEG and Eventbrite have chosen to partner with Ticketmaster rather than continuing to compete head-to-head in primary ticketing. These types of consolidations have eliminated competitors and consolidated power under the Ticketmaster umbrella.
Technology and sales network
Ticketmaster has made major investments in technology over the past two decades to build out its ticketing platform and sales network. This includes things like:
- Robust APIs to integrate ticketing with venues and partners
- Inventory management systems
- Customer databases
- Analytics and reporting
- An extensive website and mobile app
- Security systems to prevent bots and scalping
The company has also built up an extensive network of physical ticket sales locations through deals with large retailers like Walmart and Kroger. Competitors have been unable to match Ticketmaster’s technology and distribution footprint.
Brand recognition and consumer behavior
After 30+ years dominating the primary ticket sales market, the Ticketmaster brand is virtually synonymous with event ticketing in the minds of consumers. Fans instinctively go to Ticketmaster first when tickets go on sale for major concerts and games.
Competitors like AXS and Altitude have not been able to sufficiently break through this branded consumer behavior over the years. As a result, Ticketmaster enjoys continued customer loyalty and retention.
Attempts to Compete with Ticketmaster
While Ticketmaster stands head-and-shoulders above any competitors, some companies continue to try and take them on. There have been a few occasions where major venues have chosen not to renew exclusive deals with Ticketmaster in favor of other providers.
For example, AEG chose AXS as the exclusive provider for the O2 Arena in London after their deal with Ticketmaster expired. Similarly, the Los Angeles Lakers and Dallas Mavericks switched to AXS and SeatGeek respectively in recent years after letting their Ticketmaster contracts lapse.
However, these types of wins have been few and far between for Ticketmaster competitors. And even when a competitor gets exclusive rights to a major venue or team, consumers often still think to go to Ticketmaster first out of habit.
Some upstart companies are trying other methods to compete through technology-driven differentiation. For example, SeatGeek emphasizes an open ticketing approach that enables ticket resale between consumers. And ScoreBig promises everyday low pricing instead of the controversial surge pricing Ticketmaster is known for on high demand tickets.
However, these competitors have a long way to go before they make a serious dent in Ticketmaster’s dominant market share.
Market Share Over Time
Ticketmaster’s share of the primary event ticketing market has remained massive and fairly stable over the past decade plus. The following table shows their approximate share over time according to industry estimates:
| Year | Ticketmaster Estimated Market Share |
|---|---|
| 2008 | 80% |
| 2010 | 83% |
| 2015 | 82% |
| 2019 | 90% |
| 2022 | 80-90% |
As shown, Ticketmaster has maintained control of at least 80% market share at all times. Their share expanded to 90% in 2019 after securing some additional major exclusive provider deals. 2022 saw a slight drop as competitors like AXS won a couple new contracts.
But overall, Ticketmaster remains thoroughly entrenched as the dominant primary ticketing platform for major live entertainment events. Competitors have not been able to cut meaningfully into their market stranglehold.
Reasons Competitors Have Struggled
Ticketmaster’s competitors have failed to mount a serious challenge for a few key reasons:
Inability to replicate exclusive deals
As explained earlier, Ticketmaster’s numerous exclusive contracts lock competitors out of the largest venues, teams, and promoters. Rival ticketing companies simply can’t replicate those types of deals in enough volume to gain significant market share.
The exclusive contracts also extend 5-10 years in many cases. So even if a competitor lands an agreement with a major arena or team, they don’t have long-term guaranteed inventory to make a real dent.
Lack of consumer demand for alternatives
Consumers have not forced venues and teams to reconsider their Ticketmaster allegiance. Fans are accustomed to Ticketmaster being the default ticketing source and haven’t broadly advocated for competitors.
Rather than demanding other options, consumers have mainly expressed dissatisfaction regarding Ticketmaster’s high fees. But this grumbling has not led to large-scale consumer rejection of Ticketmaster in favor of competitors.
Inability to match technology and distribution
Building technology and distribution networks comparable to Ticketmaster requires an incredible investment of capital and resources. Their decades-long headstart has provided enormous advantage over upstarts.
Smaller ticketing companies simply can’t feasibly develop equivalent scalable infrastructure and platforms on their own. This hampers their ability to compete for major ticketing contracts with venues, teams, and promoters.
Lack of brand awareness
AXS, Altitude, and other Ticketmaster competitors have struggled to establish strong brand recognition and loyalty with consumers. Even in cities where they are the dominant local ticketing provider, consumers still default to checking Ticketmaster first.
These brands haven’t stood the test of time and weren’t able to leverage brand awareness to overcome Ticketmaster’s existing exclusive deals. The market remains a case where the rich get richer.
Could Ticketmaster Monopoly Be Broken Up?
Some industry observers have argued that Ticketmaster is approaching monopoly status even though they technically have competitors. There have been calls in recent years for potential antitrust action to break up their market stranglehold.
In 2019, members of the U.S. Congress opened an antitrust investigation into competition in the ticketing industry with a particular focus on Ticketmaster. Nothing has come of that investigation thus far.
Government intervention would likely be the only realistic way for Ticketmaster’s monopoly-like position to be truly threatened or dismantled. Their exclusive deals and mature business strength essentially block any emerging competitor from gaining equal market footing.
However, government action would be very politically difficult. Ticketmaster is not an obvious public enemy like Big Tech companies. They also have strong lobbying influence given their position within the broader entertainment industry.
Some analysts argue that rather than breaking up Ticketmaster, better consumer protections around transparency, fees, and pricing could create a more balanced market dynamic. But such measures would still need to be driven by government oversight.
Impact of the Pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic essentially shut down the live event industry for 18 months and curtailed demand for another year or so after. This obviously decimated Ticketmaster revenues along with the rest of the sector.
However, the pandemic does not appear to have significantly impacted Ticketmaster’s market share and competitive standing long term. If anything, their advantages of scale and exclusivity became even more important in accelerating the industry’s recovery.
During the shutdowns, some observers believed demand for live events might never fully return. In that scenario, major venues and promoters potentially could have reassessed their loyalty to Ticketmaster after seeing revenues vanish.
But fan demand came roaring back in 2022 and 2023. As a result, incumbent players like Ticketmaster were able to leverage their dominance to continue driving the bulk of ticket sales.
The pandemic recovery demonstrated that even an unprecedented disruption like COVID-19 did not weaken Ticketmaster’s standing. They remain thoroughly entrenched as the ticket sales juggernaut.
Conclusion
Despite some fringe competitors, Ticketmaster continues to have an overwhelming monopoly-like dominance of primary event ticketing. This is due to decades of exclusivity deals, industry consolidation, advanced technology, and branded consumer behavior.
Rival ticketing providers have not made any serious dent in Ticketmaster’s massive market share. Lack of comparable exclusive inventory, insufficient brand awareness, and inability to match technical infrastructure have hindered competitors.
Barring government antitrust intervention, Ticketmaster’s stranglehold on primary ticketing looks extremely secure for the foreseeable future. They have withstood the test of time and even a massive black-swan event like COVID-19. Consumers grumbling about fees have not translated to any meaningful adoption of alternative options.
In summary, Ticketmaster has no true competitor that can be considered an equivalent rival or substitute. Their position is akin to a monopoly, even as smaller niche players continue to exist. Disrupting this entrenched dominance would require forces beyond typical competitive dynamics. Absent major intervention, expect Ticketmaster to continue to reign supreme in event ticketing.