“VIAGOGO DEFIES ECONOMY, ACHIEVING EXPLOSIVE Q1 GROWTH”
London, ENG (viagogo) 7 May, 2009 – viagogo (www.viagogo.co.uk), Europe’s leading secondary ticketing company, today announced a successful first quarter of 2009 with tens of millions of dollars of tickets sold in March alone. The company continues to grow at a blistering pace despite the challenging economic conditions. Supporting viagogo’s momentum is the need for European ticket buyers to have a safe, secure place to buy tickets to their favourite events on the secondary market.
Eric Baker, CEO of viagogo said “Our goal has always been to create a site where fans can find the tickets they want, no matter what the event. We offer a safe alternative to the touts on the street and that’s important no matter what’s happening in the economy. People want to see great live events and viagogo is the site of choice to find the tickets they need.”
Recent milestones for the company include:
– Tripling the number of new monthly users
– More than one million tickets listed on the site
– Buyers coming from more than 110 countries
– Ticket sales growing by over 250% year over year in 2009
– $70 million in VC funding raised since the company’s inception
The first quarter also saw viagogo continue to sign additional high profile partnerships, including exclusive deals with Reading, Leeds, Latitude and Isle of Wight festivals, which marked the first ever secondary deals done with major music festivals. viagogo is also announcing a deal with the French Open, the first ever secondary ticketing deal in France.
viagogo founder and CEO Eric H. Baker is the co-founder and former President of StubHub, the leading secondary ticket exchange in the US. Acquired by eBay (NASDAQ: EBAY) in 2007 for $307MM, StubHub has grown to reportedly sell over $1B worth of tickets annually.
Baker launched viagogo in the fall of 2006 in an ambitious bid to bring secondary ticketing to Europe. The exchange has grown far faster than even Baker expected. “In 2008 alone – viagogo’s second year – we sold more tickets and generated more revenue than StubHub did in StubHub’s first 3 years combined,” said Baker.
From its inception, viagogo has forged groundbreaking partnerships in the live event space with the leaders in sports (Manchester United, Bayern Munich, and Chelsea FC), music (Madonna), and theater (Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Really Useful Group).
viagogo’s record growth and new deal announcements come on the back of the company’s $15M common stock financing announcement in February. Investors included Andre Agassi and Stefanie Graf, Index Ventures, and lastminute.com founder Brent Hoberman.
