It’s no surprise that Ticketmaster is the number one ticketing website to purchase concert tickets, due to their partnership with Live Nation. That should be reliable, right? Well… sometimes.  

With major artists going on tour this year including BTS, Olivia Dean, Ariana Grande, Rosalía, and Harry Styles to name a few, some fans of theirs have been facing problems and issues with how their concert tickets have been distributed, including myself.  

I love concerts. My first was Tyler the Creator in El Paso. Since then, I’ve seen most of my favorite artists such as Lana Del Rey, Billie Eilish, Beyoncé, Ethel Cain, Harry Styles and Taylor Swift. 

Recently, I was able to secure Harry Styles tickets for this year at Madison Square Garden, but it was not easy at all. But, one of my closest friends had access to get me tickets before I had a chance in the queue (thank you Bri!).I had tried to get tickets multiple times before that, with the queue line exceeding the actual capacity of the venue, or when I made it in, the cheapest ticket was only about $1000.  

And I wasn’t the only person who had recently experienced this situation with Ticketmaster. 

University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP) junior Grecia Ortega described her attempt to buy BTS tickets for the Sun Bowl.  

“So, I got floor [tickets], I got VIP, and it was almost $800. And then like lower seated were like 700 something,” Ortega said.  

When asked whether dynamic pricing affected her purchase, Ortega said she believed so.  

“Most definitely,” Ortega said. “Because when I bought tickets on floor for Coldplay, they were 90 bucks. So that’s like a 700% increase, basically like 800%.” 

Dynamic pricing presents a budgeting challenge for many college students, which is something that has usually stopped me from going to concerts sometimes. But it also makes the consumer find it harder to manage spending not for the concert ticket, but for traveling as well.  

UTEP freshman Yvette Gomez said fluctuating prices have made her reconsider attending concerts altogether. 

“Honestly, it’s been crazy right now being a full-time student and having a full-time job. My pricing range is not the best,” Gomez said. “I feel like people are going to want to go less to concerts because of that.”  

It hasn’t just been dynamic pricing that has halted people from going to concerts though, another opposition being resellers, gaining access to tickets first then reselling them at a much higher price. There had recently been controversy with Ariana Grande’s concert tickets facing this situation, as well as Olivia Dean. Both artists have taken matters into their own hands with their teams, making sure that the tickets have been refunded for the price of face value, or that they are taken from the resellers, and are put back on sale for face value.  

UTEP junior Jovanna Palacios supports these efforts. 

“I feel like it’s actually good, because a lot of resellers, it’s so crazy how much they’ll upsell it for,” Palacios said. “And I think it’s something that a lot of artists should do. Like with Olivia Dean not even making reselling an option helps so much and making the tickets affordable. Because at the end of the day, like music, it’s better when it’s live and money shouldn’t be such a big barrier to it, and it’s unnecessary.” 

At the end of the day, concerts shouldn’t be this difficult to be able to afford. It’s become a problem to the point that sometimes consumers will go out of their way to end up paying for that expensive ticket just to go to the concert. Believe me, I did it for Beyoncé. And I don’t regret it… when I don’t think about how I much I spent.  

So, a message to Ticketmaster and artists’ teams, please spare us college students by making tickets more affordable. Concerts should create fun memories and experiences, not having to complain about how much those tickets cost.  

 Aziel Ramos is a contributor and may be reached at [email protected]