Sabres Notify Some Season Ticket Holders They'll Need $5,000 Reseller License Before Renewing Membership

[Phil]

Quote

The Sabres have notified season ticket holders who resell many of their game tickets on the secondary market that they will “need to purchase a state-required $5,000 reseller license before they can renew their membership,” according to Michael Petro of the BUFFALO NEWS. The team said in an email that it has “changed its season ticket membership terms and conditions, ‘particularly in light of the recent ticket reseller laws in New York State.’” A team spokesperson said that “less than 1% of the 2023-24 season ticket member base received this communication -- a majority of the accounts being from out of state.”

 

Quote

Petro notes N.Y. “does not forbid the resale of tickets, nor does it allow for the elimination of brokers,” but state officials are now “making an effort to do more to protect the consumers making these purchases.”

 

https://www.sportsbusinessjournal.com/Articles/2024/03/11/buffalo-sabres-season-ticket-reselling-crack-down

[Pete]

If it's state-required, @Blue Heaven is in trouble.

[Blue Heaven]

1 hour ago, Pete said:

If it's state-required, @Blue Heaven is in trouble.

Thankfully this season the majority of the games that I did sell were through friends/family and not through the secondary market.  

[RichieNextel305]

So these teams want you to pay mortgage payment like prices on season tickets, and then want to essentially penalize you for trying to make a few bucks back? If you buy season tickets, they’re your tickets. If you wanna go, you go. If you wanna flip them for profit to pay off your playoff tickets, you do that. This is so absurd. Who would come up with this from the state? An asshole.

[phillyb]

If it’s state-required, why arent we seeing this for NY teams?

[Keirik]

1 hour ago, RichieNextel305 said:

So these teams want you to pay mortgage payment like prices on season tickets, and then want to essentially penalize you for trying to make a few bucks back? If you buy season tickets, they’re your tickets. If you wanna go, you go. If you wanna flip them for profit to pay off your playoff tickets, you do that. This is so absurd. Who would come up with this from the state? An asshole.

I don't know. I take a bit of a different view, but i'm not sure if the reason they are doing this is from my thinking. This stops guys from just buying tickets with the intent of just selling them to out of town fans of the opposing team.

 

You know which team this will really really hurt if it's state wide? The New York Islanders. Half their season ticket subscribers sell them.

[RichieNextel305]

Just now, Keirik said:

I don't know. I take a bit of a different view, but i'm not sure if the reason they are doing this is from my thinking. This stops guys from just buying tickets with the intent of just selling them to out of town fans of the opposing team.

 

You know which team this will really really hurt if it's state wide? The New York Islanders. Half their season ticket subscribers sell them.

I see that too. And while I agree that it’s a bad look and can be annoying, once someone commits to buying a season ticket, they can do what they like with those tickets. Especially with the prices that tickets are nowadays. Here more than elsewhere for sure. If this were like 10-15 years ago when season tickets were affordable, I’d understand. But when you hear the absurd prices people pay for tickets nowadays, I can’t blame them. I know a lot of people with Ranger tickets and even Devils tickets who have sold a lot of their games during the regular season to help pay for their playoff tickets. And they’ll go when they can, or when a rival is in town or on weekends. Or they may sell those because the garner the most resell value. Who knows? I just feel that it’s on the ticket holder to do what he wants anymore with the prices being this nuts.

[Pete]

1 minute ago, RichieNextel305 said:

I see that too. And while I agree that it’s a bad look and can be annoying, once someone commits to buying a season ticket, they can do what they like with those tickets. Especially with the prices that tickets are nowadays. Here more than elsewhere for sure. If this were like 10-15 years ago when season tickets were affordable, I’d understand. But when you hear the absurd prices people pay for tickets nowadays, I can’t blame them. I know a lot of people with Ranger tickets and even Devils tickets who have sold a lot of their games during the regular season to help pay for their playoff tickets. And they’ll go when they can, or when a rival is in town or on weekends. Or they may sell those because the garner the most resell value. Who knows? I just feel that it’s on the ticket holder to do what he wants anymore with the prices being this nuts.

They aren't saying you can't sell the tickets. They're saying if you want to resell tickets, you need to reseller license. Reseller licenses stop ridiculous price increases. You can't have businesses having to pay for a license to do something that you're letting other people do for free. 

[RichieNextel305]

11 minutes ago, Pete said:

They aren't saying you can't sell the tickets. They're saying if you want to resell tickets, you need to reseller license. Reseller licenses stop ridiculous price increases. You can't have businesses having to pay for a license to do something that you're letting other people do for free. 

So after buying season tickets for absurd amount of money, they need to then purchase a license that is excessive to resell the tickets? That eliminates the profit, which is the point, no? I don’t get it.

[Pete]

1 minute ago, RichieNextel305 said:

So after buying season tickets for absurd amount of money, they need to then purchase a license that is excessive to resell the tickets? That eliminates the profit, which is the point, no? I don’t get it.

You can't have businesses paying for something others are doing for free. 

 

It's an unintended side effect of a good law.

[Cash or Czech]

For a year, I worked for a "company" that had season tickets to almost every single team across the four major sports leagues and resold them on Stubhub, Ticketmaster, Vivid Seats, SeatGeek, etc. This law is targeted at those people. I have a feeling the ambiguity of the law means the Sabres ticket sales reps aren't sure how it impacts their season ticket holders who sell the majority of their tickets.

 

The likely smart thing for those folks to do is just buy smaller packages for games they actually go to.

Edited March 12 by Cash or Czech

[Blue Heaven]

On 3/11/2024 at 9:44 PM, RichieNextel305 said:

I see that too. And while I agree that it’s a bad look and can be annoying, once someone commits to buying a season ticket, they can do what they like with those tickets. Especially with the prices that tickets are nowadays. Here more than elsewhere for sure. If this were like 10-15 years ago when season tickets were affordable, I’d understand. But when you hear the absurd prices people pay for tickets nowadays, I can’t blame them. I know a lot of people with Ranger tickets and even Devils tickets who have sold a lot of their games during the regular season to help pay for their playoff tickets. And they’ll go when they can, or when a rival is in town or on weekends. Or they may sell those because the garner the most resell value. Who knows? I just feel that it’s on the ticket holder to do what he wants anymore with the prices being this nuts.

Thats not necessarily true, in the terms and conditions their is wording in there that MSG can revoke tickets at their discretion.  

 

I had Miami Dolphins season tixs, I sold too many games 2 seasons ago, and they revoked my tickets.....After I got the letter they went into their typical december swoon and barely made the playoffs....Same thing happened again this year to other season ticket holders....They should learn a lesson and not send the letter to revoke tickets the same time that they are issuing playoff invoices.  

[RichieNextel305]

34 minutes ago, Blue Heaven said:

Thats not necessarily true, in the terms and conditions their is wording in there that MSG can revoke tickets at their discretion.  

 

I had Miami Dolphins season tixs, I sold too many games 2 seasons ago, and they revoked my tickets.....After I got the letter they went into their typical december swoon and barely made the playoffs....Same thing happened again this year to other season ticket holders....They should learn a lesson and not send the letter to revoke tickets the same time that they are issuing playoff invoices.  

That’s brutal.

 

My last year with season tickets was 2016-17. We made the playoffs. I got my renewal for the following season at the same time I got my playoff invoice. I called to notify I wouldn’t be renewing the following season. They then told me that because of that, I wasn’t getting my playoff tickets. I was enraged. Basically because I wouldn’t commit to the following season, I wasn’t allowed to see that current season all the way through?

 

These teams don’t give a rats fuck about their fans anymore. It really is sad.

[Sod16]

1 hour ago, RichieNextel305 said:

That’s brutal.

 

My last year with season tickets was 2016-17. We made the playoffs. I got my renewal for the following season at the same time I got my playoff invoice. I called to notify I wouldn’t be renewing the following season. They then told me that because of that, I wasn’t getting my playoff tickets. I was enraged. Basically because I wouldn’t commit to the following season, I wasn’t allowed to see that current season all the way through?

 

These teams don’t give a rats fuck about their fans anymore. It really is sad.

I know people who are ex-Rangers fans because of this.  It was a remarkable turn around from a formerly fan friendly organization.  Back when they remodeled the Garden in 1989, they went to great pains to keep whole sections of season holders seated in new sections with all of the people from their old section in order to maintain friendships.  Can't imagine that today.