Kid Rock: Ticket Prices So Low I’ve Resorting To Scalping
Kid Rock says ticket prices for his summer tour are so low, he’s taking desperate measures — scalping.
The 42-year-old Grammy winner said he’s been scalping about 1,000 tickets from each show to make a little extra scratch.
“I’m in the scalping business, but you know what? We told everyone. A lot of artists have been doing this for years behind fans’ backs, taking all these backdoor deals,” Kid Rock said about the low ticket prices. “We look at StubHub and other places and see what they’re selling them for and we just undercut them.”
It’s not like fans are getting a bad deal out of it. Prices for his Best Night Ever Tour are $20 each.
Kid Rock isn’t the only one coping with ticket prices by scalping. Ticket sales on the secondary market have grown considerably thanks to sites like Stub Hub, something other artists have taken advantage of.
“If I see a scalper, I’ll scalp him,” the Rolling Stones’ Keith Richards said.
But Richards isn’t offering cheap shows like Kid Rock. Tickets for the Rolling Stones’ 50 & Counting average $355.14.
Richards said he’d make it up to fans if he could. The Stones have done something of the sort, playing a secret concert in Los Angeles for fans who won a lottery. Tickets for that show were $20.
“I’d do some free shows. I’d work my butt off, and I don’t care how much. But these are set up above my head, man,” Richards said in a recent interview. “You’re kind of locked in a thing here whether you like it or not. I wish it was five bucks a ticket.”
Kid Rock had slammed ticket prices before. Back in April on CNN’s Piers Morgan Live he criticized the “Legends of the Summer” tour of Jay-Z and Justin Timberlake. Ticket prices topped $250 in cities like Detroit and New York City.
“It’s garbage. It’s highway robbery,” Kid Rock said of the ticket prices. “I don’t care who you are. I would consider both of them in the circle of friends in the business, but I don’t agree with it.”
[Image via U.S. Air Force photo by: TSgt Sean Mateo White]
