TICKET TRANSFERABILITY HELPS SPORTS FANS SAVE $260 MILLION OVER 5 YEARS

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Jul 12, 2023, 08:04 ET

WASHINGTON, July 12, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- The Sports Fans Coalition today released a report that analyzed 25,316,259 tickets sold from 2017 – 2022 across major professional sports (MLB, NHL, NBA, MLB) and found that consumers save nearly $260 million by buying their tickets on the secondary ticket resale market. This underscores how ticket transferability is one of the most valuable consumer protections for ticket buyers. Fans often have to buy tickets months in advance, and sometimes their plans change. This is especially true of fans who invest in season tickets. If a fan cannot attend the event, they should be able to resell their ticket on the secondary market and transfer it - without encumbrance from the original seller - to another fan who can use the ticket.

Sports fans save $260 million on tickets purchased on the secondary ticket resale market because of ticketholders' ability to resell and freely transfer their tickets to another fan.

"The report is clear, when you have competitive markets, consumers win," said Brian Hess, Executive Director of Sports Fans Coalition. "We can now give you 260 million reasons why lawmakers should protect ticket transferability. The consumer savings for sports fans has exponentially grown over time and the secondary market helps lower-income fans access the games they love and allows families attending ballgames to afford food and beverages. Lawmakers in big sports states that do not yet protect transfer -- like California, Texas, and Pennsylvania -- should see this data and realize that it's in their constituents' best interest to protect ticket transferability and watch their savings skyrocket. Federally, lawmakers should pass the BOSS and SWIFT Act which protects ticket transferability and provides many other consumer protections that fans need in the marketplace."

Key Findings:

Across all MLB, NBA, NFL, and NHL tickets, tickets on the secondary market were sold below face value more than a third (35.2%) of the time.
In total, since 2017, fans saved $259,498,022 million dollars on sports tickets by buying their tickets on the secondary ticket resale market.
NHL fans were the most likely to find tickets below face value.
On a per ticket basis, fans saved about enough to buy a beer at an NFL game – on average $9.76.
Fans in states where their ability to transfer their purchased tickets is protected by law saved almost twice as much as those in states that do not protect ticket transferability or where teams, venues or others in the industry can restrict transfer.
Six states protect a fan's right to transfer their tickets. Of those, only four have professional sports teams – Colorado, New York, Illinois, and Utah. Between 2017 and 2022, fans in these states saved $56,143,376, averaging a total of $14 million per state.
In those 26 states (including Canada) which have professional sports teams and do not protect a fan's right to transfer their tickets, fans saved $203,354,646 over that same time period, averaging $7.8 million per state in fan savings.
Savings have grown nearly every year since 2017. 2022 had the most consumer savings at $87.3M across all sports. This is equivalent to 1,590% growth in consumer savings since 2017.