If you are a fan of live music, you will know what a costly business it can be to watch your favourite acts perform on stage.
Getting hold of tickets for gigs can be extremely tricky, particularly when it comes to watching some of the world’s biggest stars.
Recent research by Betway highlighted the challenges fans face in following their favourite musicians when they tour the United Kingdom.
Their study showed that tickets for four acts – BTS, Adele, Drake and Miley Cyrus – cost more than £283 when they found their way onto resale websites.
In some instances, fans often spend thousands of pounds on tickets if they are unable to obtain them when they first go on sale.
However, the data also shows that it is perfectly feasible to purchase tickets for top-class live music without breaking the bank.
Queen undoubtedly fall into that category, with fans able to obtain resale tickets for their recent UK tour for as little as £36.52.
When you compare this to the whopping £678.94 required to bag tickets to see boyband BTS, the figures beggar belief.
If the prospect of watching Queen without Freddie Mercury leaves you feeling cold, there are plenty of other excellent acts that offer great value for money on the resale market.
Dua Lipa, Ellie Goulding and Camila Cabelo are amongst the major acts fans could have obtained resale tickets for under £50 each in the past five years.
While those figures may be affordable for many fans, it can be argued that they still don’t represent value for money at a time when finances are tight.
This perhaps explains why some talented up-and-coming bands have chosen not to progress too far up the capacity scale when choosing venues for their UK tours.
A great example of this is six-piece band Red Rum Club, who generally favour playing gigs in places fans can afford to visit.
For example, their two shows In Liverpool later this year will be staged at the 1,960 capacity Olympia, with ticket prices starting at just £15.
They actively encourage fans who miss out on the original sale to use authorised fan-to-fan platforms which limit what people can charge if they decide to resell their tickets.
This methodology is in stark contrast to the tactics employed by other artists, many of which have started to use the controversial ‘dynamic pricing’ model on ticketing websites.
This algorithm-based system massively inflates ticket prices in line with demand, thus making them extremely unaffordable for many music fans.
Coldplay, Taylor Swift and Bruce Springsteen are amongst the acts who have gone down this route and have all been heavily criticised for the decision.
Although music acts are rely heavily on ticket sales to maintain their income, expecting fans to pay hundreds or thousands of pounds to watch live gigs feels wrong.
On that basis, supporting acts further down the scale who respect their fans by keeping prices affordable is unquestionably the best way to get value for money.
