A pair of lawmakers in Florida have filed new legislation that targets some of Ticketmaster’s most troublesome tactics, which critics of the company argue supercharge their already dominant market position alongside corporate parent Live Nation, the largest event promoter in the world by a huge margin.
The bills, SB 204 and HB 177, were introduced by State Senator Jason Brodeur and Rep. Alex Andrade. Both are members of the Republican party, which controls both houses of the legislature.
Neither Ticketmaster nor Live Nation are mentioned by name in the legislation, but the bills are clearly designed with the widespread consumer complaints regarding some of the industry giants’ most allegedly anti-competitive practices in mind, particularly out of last year’s disastrously botched Taylor Swift Eras Tour ticket sales process.
The proposed legislation would ban ticketing companies from signing a “sole source” (exclusive) contract with a venue that has received taxpayer funding in the last ten years, which would do away with the preferred venue contract system employed by Live Nation and Ticketmaster, which typically require exclusivity and long-term deals, which many argue is a huge driver in sky-high fee structures due to the lack of competition. The bills also ban the practice of requiring tickets to be resold through a preferred vendor – another tactic increasingly used by the industry giants to allegedly hobble competition from resale platforms.
Lastly, the legislation would require price transparency, meaning the price displayed at the initial point of advertising would have to include all fees, rather than hiding such “junk” fees to the last step of the transaction.
The last provision is the least likely to draw significant opposition from anyone within the ticket sales industry: by and large, both primary and resale operations have stated they would be happy to do “all-in” pricing, provided that it is a requirement rather than a suggestion due to the competitive advantage that hiding fees gives to companies that aren’t transparent. Such requirements have already become law in several states, and are on the table at the federal level both legislatively, as well as via rulemaking by the Federal Trade Commission.
Live Nation and Ticketmaster are certain to fiercely oppose the rest of the measures being proposed, however. The entertainment giants have consistently made efforts to blame all consumer anger on the ticketing industry and surged prices consumers face now on resale marketplaces, including under oath at a Senate Judiciary subcommittee hearing earlier this year. Rather than change of the business practices that have enabled it to gobble up competitors and eliminate competition, the company argues that it should be able to act as de facto regulator of its own industry, via its own preferred set of reforms that would include the ability to declare all tickets sold on competing websites “fraudulent” among other things.
The Florida legislation, filed on Monday, does not yet have a hearing date scheduled.
