Live Nation and Groupon team up to off-load pricey tickets
These arms built capitalism.
Groupon and Live Nation announced a new partnership today. The not-so-cleverly named GrouponLive purports to be a “source for the world’s best deals on local entertainment,” though skeptics have already noted that it could also just be a good way for Live Nation to quickly get rid of overpriced tickets.
As to what this means for the venues, performers, and employees who make their livelihood off of artists touring is anyone’s guess. This is pure speculation, but this program will likely only really work with larger-scale performances, like arena and amphitheater shows, with tickets that might be selling poorly. Artists have less to lose there, whereas the promoter—Live Nation—has a lot more to lose, and would probably settle for off-loading tickets if it meant breaking even.
Madonna’s manager, Guy Oseary, is on Groupon’s advisory board. Having dealt with Live Nation to organize Madonna’s 360 deal, Oseary was instrumental in setting up this partnership, which seems to support the whole “big artists only” assertion above. Live Nation does promote smaller shows, from Aisha Tyler at Zanies to Rise Against at the Aragon—but we’ll see how this whole thing shakes out.
