Ticketmaster no longer has dominance over ticketing in the Broadway industry.
At one time, the ticketing giant served 15 Broadway theaters, however, they’ve now been booted to only one: the New Amsterdam Theatre. The huge shift in ticketing providers is largely due to the Nederlander Organization, which parted ways with Ticketmaster to use its own ticketing service, BroadwayDirect. The Nederlanders own nine theaters, which act as a direct competition to the Shubert Organization’s Telecharge ticketing service.
There is one more player in the ticketing game: SeatGeek. Jujamcyn Theaters split with Ticketmaster a few years ago, choosing the secondary ticketer as the exclusive service for its five theaters.
While BroadwayDirect first launched in 2011, it didn’t begin to offer online ticket lotteries until 2016. Then, last year, it bought the ticketing technology company TixTrack.
“The Lion King” became the most recent show to make the switch to BroadwayDirect. As the longest-running show on Broadway, “The Lion King” has been affiliated with Ticketmaster for over 20 years; it was even the first production to use the ticketing service’s online platform in 2002. However, since “The Lion King’s” Miskoff Theatre is owned by the Nederlanders.
Now, only one show uses Ticketmaster as it’s sole provider: “Aladdin.”
While there was no public reason for the Nederlanders’ switch from Ticketmaster, executives at the organization told Forbes that using their own ticketing company allows them to collect service fees and customer data. This helps them gain insight into important demographics like ticket purchase patterns, allowing them to decide which shows to book in certain theaters.
Another likely reason for the split, however, could be due to Ticketmaster’s negative press recently. Although the ticketing giant controls the industry with its parent company Live Nation, both fans and legislators have been outspoken about breaking-up its monopoly. The fiasco with Taylor Swift’s The Eras Tour even sparked a hearing by the U.S. Senate’s Judiciary Committee.
