For the past five years, has published the standalone International Ticketing Yearbook (ITY), highlighting the ticketing business in more than 40 key markets around the world, as the live events business continued to grow. Rather than skipping the 2020 edition, given the lack of concerts, festivals and shows, this year, we are paring back the yearbook to provide an overview of the past few months during the pandemic, and examining what ticketing experts have been working on while the industry plans to get back to business in 2021…
2020 Event Ticket Sales Despite international touring grinding to a halt in March 2020, the ingenuity of artists, event organisers and promoters has provided a limited number of shows and festivals around the world, while pay-per-view live-streaming concerts have also proved popular with fans internationally. Every company IQ spoke to for ITY 2020 states that the sales slump has been unprecedented – mostly down by more than 90% – as physical events have all but disappeared over the past nine months. Reporting its fiscal results for the first nine months of 2020, Europe’s largest ticketing firm, CTS Eventim revealed a 79% decline in turnover,
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to €228.7m, in financial quarters one to three. For its part, Ticketmaster parent company, Live Nation, reported that festivals where fans can retain their tickets for next year’s show had seen approximately 63% of fans are keeping their tickets. The company’s sales and survey data suggests that fan demand will be there when the time is right. “Our refund rate on rescheduled shows remains consistently low, with 83% of fans globally keeping their tickets,” says Live Nation in its latest financial results. “Our recent global survey indicates that 95% of fans are planning to return to live music events when restrictions are lifted, the highest point of confidence since the start of the pandemic.”
The pandemic has taken its toll on markets large and small. In Dubai, Vassiliy Anatoli, managing director of events guide and ticketing platform, Platinumlist, tells a similar tale. “Sales stopped mid-March with lots of refunds to follow. We resumed sales with comedy events in July, which sold out, with most post-Covid events being supported by the UAE government.” Comedy proved successful elsewhere, too. Emil Ionescu, general managing partner of Romania's leading ticket company, iaBilet, says local event organisers’ association AROC has worked diligently on a reopening plan, with promoters able to put on open-air shows to a maximum of 500 people from the start of June.