This month has been a hectic month for Taylor Swift fans. Swifties, as they call themselves, have been in an uproar recently over getting tickets for her latest tour. Last month Swift released her tenth studio album, “Midnights.” The album is very different from her last two albums “Folklore” and “Evermore,” since she returned back to the pop sound of her other albums. I myself enjoy the album, but in my opinion, it is not my favorite of hers. I’m more of a “1989” girl.
Just a few weeks after she released the album, she announced that she will be embarking on a tour in 2023. The “Eras Tour” will reflect on her entire music career. This is the first time she will be going on tour since 2018! Naturally, fans were eager to get tickets for this anticipated tour. Since the release of “Folklore,” there has been an increase in Taylor Swift fans, so longtime fans of hers had to be prepared to battle for tickets.
On top of that, the re-release of “Red” also garnered new Taylor Swift fans. In order for her most loyal fans to be able to attend the concert, Taylor announced she will partner with Ticketmaster and Capital One to hold a verified fan presale on Nov. 15.
In order to get this presale code, you first had to register on Ticketmaster to possibly be chosen for the presale. Basically, registering on Ticketmaster did not guarantee a presale code. On Nov. 14, Ticketmaster sent out the codes to the verified fans.
This is where everything starts to get messed up. Some people received a code but no email and other people received an email and no code. The next day the presale queue opened up at 10 a.m., and then the complications started. Many people were in line for upwards of five hours. My mom waited in line from 10 a.m. to about 2 p.m. By the time we got to the seating chart the majority of the good seating was gone and the prices were incredibly expensive.
My family was one of the small number of registered presale fans that got tickets to the tour. Somehow, luck was on our side that day. For many other people, they were not as lucky.
As I said earlier, there were a lot of other complications. Throughout the day, the queue was paused because many presale codes were not working. Another complication was that when people input their information, the page refreshed and they lost their tickets. Ticketmaster also gave away more presale codes than they should have, so many people with codes did not even get the chance to get tickets.
The Capital One presale was moved to the following day, and even then there were not a lot of seats available for them. Ticketmaster also sold people nonexistent tickets, so some people received emails saying they were being refunded. Finally, Ticketmaster canceled the general sale on Friday, Nov. 18 because all the seats were sold out. In all, the whole ticket-selling process was a mess.
I am frustrated with how all of this was handled. There was no reason for this process to be so complicated and so misleading. Swift and Ticketmaster handled this situation in a terrible way.
First, the verified fan process was done in the wrong way. Basically, those who bought merch from Taylor’s site had a better chance of getting presale than those who did not. I do not think that is a good method of telling who is a loyal fan or not.
Second, how did Ticketmaster oversell tickets and give out more presale codes than available? For all of the people saying Taylor did not have a part in how Ticketmaster did this, I disagree. Swift is the head of her team. She chose to work with Ticketmaster. Her statement did nothing to rectify the situation.
Many fans are upset and really angry with Taylor Swift. As a Swiftie myself, I am upset with Taylor too. I think it is okay to be mad at her. You can still enjoy her music while acknowledging a lot of her faults. She loves her money, and it shows. I do think it is a stab in the back for all of her loyal and longtime fans, since many did not get tickets. She should take better action in situations like this. So many people look up to her, and she really let people down.
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