My (short) life as a ticket scalper
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by MECU
I got lucky. I got 4 tickets to Game 5 of the World Series at Coors Field. I have never done anything like this before. I usually try and buy tickets to game I want to go to and never get them.
However, getting the tickets was a lot easier than scalping them. You would think one of the hottest tickets currently would be easy to sell. But I spent 13 hours trying to sell them.
Getting the tickets
I decided to try and get tickets because it would be an easy buck. Such rare occurrences in life where you can practically guarantee to buy low and sell high with little risk. My first mistake is lesson 1: Go in with a plan of how much you're willing to pay and then resell to make. Willing to spend up to $500? $1,000? $10,000? Make $200? Make $1,000? Anything less than <cost of item you want to buy> not acceptable?
I tried on Monday, but couldn't even get through the website. Thankfully, (for me) no one else could either. So Tuesday, 10 minutes before noon, (they opened it early) and I get into the ticket sales. Lesson 2: Never believe the time they are saying they will start selling tickets. Always start early.
I clicked on "Game 3" and asked for 3 club level seats. I'm surprised when I get them, so I give the seats up. Lesson 3: Don't waste time getting less than you could. Don't waste time "checking out what you could get." I never wanted less than 4 seats, so why did I bother trying to put in 3?
I put in 4 and clicked "Infield Box". The website then times out. I'm pissed. I refresh the page several times. My tickets reappear. YES! GOLD! OIL! A LICENSE TO PRINT MONEY! I've got 4 tickets to section 125 row 26. I have to register an account. Each page loading is taking 5 minutes now. I get through the registration and get the "order confirmation" page and click "PRINT MY MONEY!" (or the other name people know this button by, "Confirm Order") and, I get an error message: "error: your order can not be verified <link>try again</link>". That's it. NOOOOO! My riches and dreams are gone. Lesson 4: Don't count your chickens before they hatch. Only when you have a confirmation number do you have tickets.
I try and decide if I want to give it all up. I figure I'm 40 minutes into this, I might as well try again. I have to start all over. I figure the only seats left by now are going to be in the Rockpile (bleachers). I put in for 4 seats in "Best Available" and by some miracle, I get 4 infield box seats section 141! I STRUCK OIL AGAIN! I don't have to register again, so I'm clicking BUY BUY BUY. The page times out. Refresh. Time out. Refresh. GOLD! I've got a confirmation number. This is probably the first time I've ever printed the order confirmation page when I bought something online. Lesson 5: Always try again.
It's been 80 minutes now. I figure "Hey, maybe I can get some more tickets?" I try for game 4 but they seem to have nothing. I try game 5 and get 4 outfield reserved, section 302L. I'm lucky. Lesson 6: Keep trying to get more. I tried to get some game 4 after this, but had to leave otherwise I'd probably still be sitting there trying to get them.
Selling the tickets
I had two sets of 4. I had promised my friend if I got tickets and he didn't I'd sell him some. He didn't get ticket and wanted the game 3 tickets. So off I am to try and sell the game 5 tickets. The thing is, game 5 isn't a guarantee (yet). People are a little hesitant to buy something when there's no guarantee they're worth anything. Lesson 7: Always try and buy the guaranteed games first if it matters (NFL doesn't matter).
I asked around and got an offer immediately for double the price. Then a friend's friend at their work wanted them. He beat the offer by $50 and a big sob story about how he'd been to every home game and is a huge Rockies fan and so on. Lesson 8: When people get desperate and can't (or won't) afford the real price, they try and appeal to your heart strings. Even your friends will do this.
The next day I checkout craigslist.org. You can post for free. There aren't too many postings so I give it a shot. However, there are some really upset fans who just flag every ticket offer getting it removed. I posted 10 times over 6 hours and 3 stick. However, the number of postings goes insane. There were probably 500 at any given time and probably 5000 or more during the day since most are getting removed fast. I probably got about 10 e-mails total, but none are willing to beat my best offer now. The number of sob stories are amazing. The number of crybabies are amazing. Lesson 9: You are not entitled to tickets. This is America, capitalism rules. Welcome to Supply & Demand 101. By fighting the system, the terrorists have already won.
While I'm trying craigslist, I checkout the online sale places. Stubhub, Ebay and more. Stubhub takes 15% of the sale price. I'm also not willing to commit my tickets to these places since I may get a better deal off craigslist. The prices on Stubhub are the worst anywhere. Ebay tickets are selling low (reasonable). I decide to save that for a last-second try if I still have the tickets later. Lesson 10: Online ticket sales are a rip-off, especially though "ticket specialty" places. Ebay is reasonable. Craigslist is a crap shoot.
Next is to try and sell directly to a broker. I start e-mailing and calling brokers. Lesson 11: They want hard tickets, not e-tickets. They're worried about being scammed by fakes or I could sell the same ticket multiple times. I wouldn't do that, but it's possible which is why e-tickets are worth less. Some brokers won't deal with them at all. Always get hard tickets if possible. Better for the buyer, seller and middle folks.
All the brokers want me to name a price. Due to my research I see that tickets are selling for about $750 each. That's $3000. I start asking for $2500. Again, I'm confronted with the fact that game 5 isn't a sure deal. one nice broker was willing to talk to me and told me he'd pay $350 right now for the same seats for game 4. That's $1400, 50% of what they are selling for online. Lesson 12: Brokers will pay you 50% of what the tickets are worth or selling for online. They're trying to make money too.
Through some e-mails, I get a guy from Craigslist willing to pay $1200 and 2 CU vs. Nebraska 50-yardline 2nd row seats (worth $250) for it. I ask him how he wants to pay and when and start trying to set it up. He then learns they are e-tickets and backs out. He's worried about being scammed. I understand, but I am no scammer and practically beg him to keep going and offer to give my full address, phone, drivers license and the works. He then says "I have no doubt you are an honorable guy, but I don't want to buy e-tickets." Like that makes sense? So I'm back to my backup offer, $850. I just lost tickets to my alma matter and $350 (bye bye iPod). Fine. I commit to this guy for $850. I'm getting tired of this game and the run around and all the time and effort it's taking. This was supposed to be easy money? I then get an e-mail offering $1000. But I don't know this person and want to make sure they won't back-out when they find out it's e-tickets, so I state they are e-tickets and are they sure for $1000? I get an e-mail reply: "Well, let me talk to my friend to see if they want to do it." I never hear from them again. Lesson 13: Not all offers will be serious. Now I know why people put "only serious offers" on Craigslist.
In total, I got offers for $450, $500, $800 (twice) $850, $1000 and $1450 ($1200 plus the tix). If I had waited until a game 5 was known to be played, maybe I could have gotten more. But I just wanted to dump the tickets as fast as possible.
Summary of lessons learned
I choose the e-tickets when buying because I thought it would be easier to sell them. Turns out it was much harder. Hard (paper) tix would be much easier to unload.
Never promise a friend to sell them your tickets. I could have made $3000 off the tickets I sold to him but instead made $200. No HD TV for me. He even tried a sob story how he couldn't afford them. Yah right. He's about to buy a million dollar house in Denver and just got promoted to Director of Engineering. A reminder of less 8: Even your friends will try and sob-story you. I wasn't out to scalp my friend, but asking for $50/ticket above what I paid isn't scalping. Haggling with your friends over $100 isn't fun.
Have a plan on how you are going to sell them from the start: I tried different approaches which conflicted with each other. Pick the internet. Pick a broker. Pick your friends. But don't pick more than one of those.
Was it worth it?
My net: $650. Including the 3 hours I spent buying them, that's $40.625/hour. Only a little better than my regular paying job.
For the 15 hours I spent, no. For the joy of spending the money and enjoying my new ... um, I haven't decided what to spend the money on. The options are iPod, Nintendo Wii, Satellite radio and good alcohol, or a combination of each.
