Are Irish Concert-Goers Being Ripped Off?

Here we go again. When tickets for Tom Waits’ Dublin gigs went on sale, they sold out, all 18,000 of them, within a matter of hours. And yet almost as quickly, a hubbub started about the cost of the tickets and the Irish being ripped off – presumably inspired by the people who wanted to go but dithered over the price and then lost out.

On one level, you’d have to say, tough. You don’t want to pay €116 or €132 don’t pay it. But stop whinging. Concerts aren’t an essential service, like the electricity, water or the trains. There is no obligation on anyone either to perform for a standard, internationally-approved fee or to pay a particular ticket price to gain entrance to a show. It’s a free market transaction of a relatively straightforward type.
On the other hand, the difference between the prices for Tom Waits tickets in Ireland and the US is particularly striking. Here, fans are paying more or less twice as much as in the States. The US economy is among the strongest in the world, so why should we have to pay more than someone in, say, Dallas?
A fair question. But what bothers me is that, no matter how often you explain the real dynamic involved, the same old arguments are trotted out again and again in response. We’re being ripped off. It’s the promoters. They’re making millions.
Which on occasion they may be. But they’re not philanthropists. And I don’t know any of the major promoters in Ireland or elsewhere who pretend to be. The fact, however, is that in the end it is up to the artist.
A few simple observations first. Ireland is an island. It costs money for international acts to travel here. The same is true for US artists travelling to the UK, but generally because of the difference in population and the far greater number of major cities and venues there, the relevant costs can be spread over a bigger number of shows. Also, historically, insurance costs have been higher here too. I could go on: we all know that Ireland is an expensive place to operate. So that’s part of the picture.
But it is a relatively small part. The fundamental nature of the system and how it works has a far greater influence. In general, when an artist of real international standing, like Tom Waits, Morrissey or Prince – to take a few that are currently Ireland-bound – wants to play Ireland their agent gets the sales pitch going by calling one or two of the potential promoters. Prince is available. It’ll be huge. We're billing it as the last tour he’ll ever do his greatest hits. Everyone who ever bought a Prince album will need to see it. Millions are being spent on the production. Interested?
What happens is similar to a tendering process. If the artist is huge, the battle can be intense: one promoter offers the RDS. Another Croke Park. A third has a previously unused stately home that’d be just perfect for this act. Another suggests something strange and unusual: I’ll see if I can get the grounds of Áras an Uachtaráin. And someone else – a newcomer to the high stakes end of the business – has a sexy new site that’s never been used before: a runway at Dublin Airport. The agent takes all of these suggestions seriously. It’s his job. So he says okay, tell me how much, the capacity, the ticket price and give me all of the other important details: what’s the local infrastructure like and so forth.
The pressure is on. Each of the promoters is trying to second-guess the other. They do their sums. They know that if they don’t make a decent offer they’re out. They make their bids and back it all up with figures. A crude example: the venue holds 30,000. At a ticket price of 80 euro, we’ll turnover 2.4 million. Costs will run to 0.8 million. I’ll pay you 85% of the balance. That’s 1.3 million. I’ll do that against a guarantee of 1 million. This promoter knows in his gut that it will be a sell-out.
One of the other guys comes up with a 1.8 million offer. It’s a far bigger venue and the ticket price is lower – but what happens if you only reach 60% of capacity? There are other twists in the various offers, but the biggest issue, most of the time, is money. It’s the agent’s job to get the most possible. Besides, he’s on a commission: it’s in his interest to raise the bar. He goes back to the first promoter. Explains he’s got a more attractive offer. The horse trading starts in earnest.
In essence promoters are gamblers. They bet on the public’s appetite to see a particular show. They bet on their willingness to pay, in the appropriate numbers, the relevant ticket price. If they get it wrong they can lose their shirts. The late Jim Aiken, who was the pioneer of major international promotions in Ireland, confided once that 1985 was a phenomenally successful year for him. He did U2 at Croke Park. Bruce Springsteen at Slane. Packed houses. Brilliant shows. But he also promoted the Russian Circus in Dublin that year, for a prolonged run. Nowadays it would be a sell-out. Back them it bombed. Everything he made on a summer into which he’d put everything was lost on the circus. It would have broken the spirit of a lesser man.
To thrive as a promoter , you have to have balls of steel. You’d need them just to put some of the offers that are out there on the table. You have to be prepared to lose money on smaller shows to build relationships. You have to try to identify acts that will become huge and nurture them when they’ll pull no more than 100 people. And because of the smaller size of the Irish market, and the fact that there’s three or four main players rather than ten, it gets a lot more intense and competitive.
I’m not saying pity the poor promoter, though there’s lots of guys out there who struggle to make a fist of it. It is a ruthless business. But where the big gigs are concerned, what I am saying is this: the prices are agreed with the artists. They know exactly what’s happening. They also take the lion’s share of the loot.
There are instances, loads of them, where a lesser offer is accepted. The act gets on with the promoter. They trust him to do a good job. They like the venue. Doing a smaller show appeals to them. And – in some instances – they don’t want to exceed a certain threshold on ticket prices. Simon and Garfunkel famously came to Dublin some years ago and were paid just half of the money that had been offered by another promoter for the same date. They didn’t want to charge more than €50, or whatever the ticket price was. Tom Waits went for a lesser offer because he preferred to do the gig in a tent rather than outdoors.
The agent gives advice on all of this. But the final call is with the artists and their management: we’ll charge 50 or 60 or 70 or 100 euro a ticket. For sure, the promoter plays a part. When it’s all about percentages, the bigger the gross, the more the promoter earns. But in the end, the artist has the power. And in terms of value it’s all relative. Twenty pints or a Tom Waits ticket? Experience great art or get polluted? Looking at it that way makes Waits brilliant value. And he will be.
One other thing. People seem to hate the other guy making money – but how would they react in similar circumstances? A guy offers you a grand for a car you’re selling. Another guy goes to 1,200. A third comes along and says I think it’s worth 2 grand. Turns out it’s a rare model. A fourth guy ups the ante further: he’ll give you 4k if he can have it here and now.
How many people will go: no, this car is really only worth a thousand. A stupid inflated value is being put on it because there’s a bunch of idiots out there who are into collecting this shit. I’ll call that first fellah and he can have it? The answer is none.
It is important to retain your idealism: it’s an essential part of what makes Hot Press tick. And there are plenty of people who are not really greatly motivated by money. But the vast majority want to get a bit more for whatever they have to sell, if there’s a willing buyer. Damien Hirst might think it’s mad that someone will fork out 2 million for a work of art that took him a week to do. But what sense would it make for him to say hang on, there’s an upper limit of 1 million, thanks?
So, if you don’t want to pay the price give the show a miss. You’re not a heroin addict after a fix...