'The Hunger Games of tickets': Milwaukee Taylor Swift fans among millions left devastated as Ticketmaster crashes, cancels public sale

 

MILWAUKEE (CBS 58) -- If you haven't secured tickets to Taylor Swift's recently announced "The Eras" tour, unfortunately, you might be too late.

This is the megastar's first tour since 2018 and as a surprise to nobody, tickets were in high demand.

But what was unexpected however, was how high that demand would go. 

According to a statement released by Ticketmaster, over 3.5 million people pre-registered for the Verified Fan sale -- the largest registration event in the site's history.

"Historically, around 40% of invited fans actually show up and buy tickets, and most purchase an average of 3 tickets. So working with the artist team, around 1.5 million people were invited to participate in the on sale for all 52 show dates, including the 47 sold by Ticketmaster," the statement said in part. "The remaining 2 million Verified Fans were put on the waiting list."

The company said that normally Verified Fan codes help manage the volume of traffic flooding into the site.

"However, this time the staggering number of bot attacks as well as fans who didn’t have invite codes drove unprecedented traffic on our site, resulting in 3.5 billion total system requests – 4x our previous peak," the statement continued.  

This meant that for the millions who tuned in, some sales were slowed while others were pushed forward to help stabilize the system.

Ticketmaster estimated about 15% of interactions experienced issues which the company said is "15% too many."

Even with that percentage, over 2,000,000 tickets were sold to buyers with Verified Fan codes which is the most tickets they have sold in a single day.

Millions of fans, however, remain disappointed with how the company handled the pre-sale -- a disappointment that only grew after Ticketmaster announced on Thursday, they would be cancelling Friday's general public sale.

Due to extraordinarily high demands on ticketing systems and insufficient remaining ticket inventory to meet that demand, tomorrow's public on-sale for Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour has been cancelled.

— Ticketmaster (@Ticketmaster) November 17, 2022

For Heather Young of Kenosha, the cancellation means that unless she secures resale tickets at affordable prices, her daughters will be unable to attend what's supposed to be their first concert.

"It let us pick seats but then it kept saying we can't purchase tickets on this device, or it would say, 'sorry, somebody else took your tickets,'" Young said. 

Young, her 14-year-old daughter and her mother had all signed up for presale codes. She spent nearly eight hours on multiple devices, hoping to be moved forward in the queue.

"It was the same thing, you'd get to the end, and it would err out," Young said. 

She noted that an acquaintance on Facebook had posted they were selling their tickets to somewhere in the 400 section for the stadium show in Chicago.

"These tickets were probably going for $99 dollars," Young said, adding that she reached out with intentions of purchasing. "She sends me a message and she's like, 'okay, they're $800 dollars apiece."

Angela Stadelman, who calls herself a 'Swiftie,' described presale day as "the Hunger Games of tickets."

"It was really overwhelming and frustrating because a lot of people dedicated the majority of their day to this presale," Stadelman said. "It's definitely unfortunate to the fans, the many fans that got screwed over, that have tried really hard and put their time and energy into getting tickets. And they didn't because of the unfortunate service of Ticketmaster."

Stadelman said she was kicked out of the queue multiple times as the site continued to crash, creating a "rollercoaster" of emotions.

"It's stressful already trying to get tickets, right. But it's more stressful when you're in that really hectic process when the service that you are using is not cooperating," Stadelman said. "We shouldn't have to worry about that."

She ended up getting tickets on Wednesday at the Capital One presale, but Stadelman said it shouldn't have come to that point. 

"I love Taylor Swift. She's one of my favorite artists ever. I feel bad for the fans that didn't get tickets because being in that position that day was very draining," Stadelman said. 

Cassie Ostertag, another 'Swiftie,' echoed the same sentiments, adding that it took her a full workday to secure tickets to the Minneapolis show.

"I had the computer set up an hour in advance, but I spent about eight hours waiting," Ostertag said. "I've never experienced anything like that."

Ostertag said being able to say she secured tickets "feels insane."

"I feel very lucky. I just feel fortunate enough I was able to grab some, even after all that waiting," Ostertag said. "I clapped my hands and was jumping up and down like we finally did it!"

According to Ticketmaster, their "leading ticketing technology" wasn't perfect for Taylor's sale.

"But we’re always working to improve the ticket buying experience. Especially for high demand on sales, which continue to test new limits," the statement said. "While it’s impossible for everyone to get tickets to these shows, we know we can do more to improve the experience and that’s what we’re focused on."