From Billy Eilish and Sabrina Carpenter to Kendrick Lamar and SZA, 2025 promises to be another big year for live music events. That may also mean concert participants will fire more for their favorite shows.
Entering movies, theaters and concerts have increased 20% since 2021, after steadily rising after the pandemic, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Consumer Price Index data.
Still, consumers are highly resistant to price increases, also known as “funflation.”
According to a recent report from Couponcabin, concert participants attended an average of seven shows in 2024, with most of them scheduled for 2025.
In December, a survey of over 1,000 music fans found that nearly 36% would spend between $100 and $499 on concert tickets in 2025, while over 17% would spend up to $1,000.
Chalk “Funflation”
After testing new restrictions in 2024, Americans have caught shows like Taylor Swift’s ERAS tour, proving that they aim to bring so-called passionate tourism to the spotlight and splurge.
Young adults, especially Generation Z and Millennials, have even said they will pay their debts to pursue some of these experiences, other recent reports show.
Two of five Gen Z and millennial travelers have spent up to $5,000 on tickets alone for live events at their destination.
Why concert tickets are so expensive
According to Joe Bennett, a forensic musicologist at Berklee College of Music, dynamic prices are blamed on escalating price tags.
Dynamic prices originally created by economists in the late 1920s refer to higher prices invoices at a time of greater demand. Consumers often associate airline ticket prices with shifts and how fares can be adjusted during busy times, Bennett said.
“We all know that if you’re looking for Uber or Lyft, there’s a more expensive night time. The market seems to be adapting to that,” he said. “However, concert tickets were generally at a fixed price.”
That’s not the case anymore. And now there is growing awareness and controversy around practice regarding purchasing a very popular event ticket.
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“I cry a lot, but I’m very productive, it’s art.”
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According to Andrew Mall, an associate professor of music at Northeastern University, the way and when dynamic pricing is used at the discretion of an artist or management is often determined under the radar.
However, on many recent well-known tours, “certainly, dynamic pricing has skyrocketed at the forefront of concert attendees,” he recently told CNBC.
Ticketmaster is currently investigating the recent use of dynamic pricing in selling reunion concerts from Britpop band Oasis in the UK.
Many Oasis fans joined social media to complain that they would have more than double the face value of their tickets without warning. The band said they would abandon North American foot practice on the tour.
Swift reportedly refused to dynamically price her ERAS tour tickets because “she didn’t want to do it to her fans.”
How ticket pricing has evolved
Throughout the 21st century, revenues from recorded music have declined, but revenues from live music events have increased. By the mid-2000s, the concert “provided a greater revenue stream for performers than record sales and public loyalty,” economist Alan Kruger wrote on economic issues and trends in the rock and roll industry. I’m writing this in.
According to Statista data, revenues for the live music industry rose 25% in 2023 alone.
Ticketmaster in 2011 first introduced an early version of dynamic ticket prices. This has become the standard for ticket sales for live music.
Bennett said that the recent increase in Megastar Stadium Tours “has gone crazy,” and “ticket sales have gone crazy.”
“I see why it’s so appealing,” he said. “The live music industry is constantly leaving money at the tables that fans pay. Dynamic pricing is like a capitalist inevitability given the power they play, but the world where a daughter spends $1,000 I don’t want to live in. See Taylor Swift.”
Still, according to Matt Schulz, chief credit analyst at LendingTree, ticket-selling platforms typically charge ticket-by-tickets, depending on the demand for the event.
“As you can imagine, it’s not that popular,” Schultz said. “Companies and musicians are trying to see what the market can play, and things really get harder for consumers.”
Why are expensive tickets here to stay?
“Consumers don’t like the idea of ​​dynamic pricing, but there have been new ‘yoro’ (you’re only alive once) over the past few years, which drives an increasingly devilish approach. “We are pleased to announce that we are committed to providing a range of services and services to our customers,” said Greg McBride, Chief Financial Analyst at Bankrate.com.
Even if household budgets are tense, he said, “it’s where there’s an experience where consumers have drawn the line and that’s not something I’d give up.”
Ticket sellers also seem to recognize this mentality.
“Our research consistently says that concerts are a top priority for discretionary spending and one of the last experiences fans will be able to cut,” Live Nation said in its quarterly revenue for 2023. I said it in the call.
But as consumers don’t continue to spend money on seeing their favorite artists and groups, this means that dynamic pricing remains at least for now.
“The live music sector has been leaning towards this attitude for a long time,” said Northeastern University’s Mall.
