Hartford 10C Ticket Debacle

TrixieCat wrote:

This coming from the guy who rocked the front row with one of the nicest people on this board.

We will kick it soon.
It was fun! I met 2 people that tried to dine and dash...2 people from Holland, not Amsterdam, hung with my friend Steve, met a few other cool souls...it was way too crowded in there for me...I was on the sidewalk or in the window.

he he-you heard about that....:)
Agreed he is a great guy and we had a blast rocking the joint.
fourth row actually there were three pit rows gosh darn it

ah if it was too crowded I would have been outta there.......

dine and dash? I havent even heard that phrase in 10 years!

i don't have a problem saying this band owes me.you know how much $ i have put into this band over the past 12 years of my life...........

enough to have a really really nice car......so they can do me a favor once and a while......

I was there on Friday and here is what I think happened.

The Dodge center has an insanely poor parking system. There are 2 main "free" lots and one other "free" lot about a 7-8 min walk away. I say "free" because you don't have to pay, but there is a $6 parking fee included on your ticket.

Then there are all these non-venue lots that charge $20 - $25. You see these before you see the "free" ones (and they are open much earlier). So when you are thinking about getting in some nice tailgaiting time, you have a choice to make. Do I suck it up and spend the extra $ so I get in an extra 1/2 or so or tailgaiting (plus get out of there quicker later)? or do I wait in traffic and go to the "free" lots (which I think, correct me if I'm wrong - didn't open until around 6)? some of these non-venue lots are also a significant (~10 min) walk to the ticket window.

so again, tough choices. with work and traffic, if you went to one of the non-venue lots, you would have had to have forfieted your whole tailgaiting time because it would have taken you 10 mins to walk over there, 20-30 mins to wait in line, 10 mins to walk back to your car and then ANOTHER 10 to walk back to go in. tailgaiting is not just fun but cost-efficient as well - considering the prices of beers inside. there are no bars around the Dodge like there are at many other places either. it's the parking lot or inside, period.

so what you have is a situation where people who have been to tons of shows and never had any real ticket pick-up problems say, if I get on line at 8, and PJ takes the stage at 9:15, there is no way it will take and hour and 15 mins. so they either go to one of the non-venue lots that are far away, or the "free" lots that don't open up until pretty late in the afternoon. either way, that's a ton of people waiting until 7:30 / 8 ish to get in line. And all for reasons that legitimately make sense.

I, unlike many others, have had 10C ticket pick-up problems in the past. so I get on line as early as humanly possible. in this case it meant giving up an hour of tailgaiting and spending probably $50 for beer inside all told. But I wouldn't have enjoyed myself anyway without the peace of mind of having my tickets in hand.

So I got in line around 6:45. The line was slow but moving. When I got into the 10C ticket fenced-in area, there were NO alpha break-outs of the lines. I have never seen this before. the Dodge center employees were taking members ID's to the back and getting the tix from the 10c employees. I got my tix about 7:15. Not a problem but not terrificly smooth either.

My buddy and I then went to meet some other friends, and by 8pm we started to go in. I obviously noticed the 10C line and was astounded.

So...what I think happened was, around 7:30 - 7:45 the 10C employees, based on experience, noticed that there were still a TON of tix left to distribute. Since the line was moving pretty slow as it was, they probably said to the Dodge people, look - unless you want a real mess on your hands, just listen to us and let us do the alpha-break out lines. this probably resulted in a 10 - 15 minute arguement/discussion and when decided on prob took another 15 - 20 mins to impliment. this change in tactics, which obviously happened since people after this time are reporting there WERE alpha-sorted lines, obviously slowed things down to a crawl. Compound that with all of the people who got in line later than they normally would care to - it was the friggin perfect storm.

mostly the venue's fault - for the natural set-up of it, the parking retardedness, and them not listening to the 10C on the best way to do it until it was too late.

jimc3 wrote:

I was there on Friday and here is what I think happened.

The Dodge center has an insanely poor parking system. There are 2 main "free" lots and one other "free" lot about a 7-8 min walk away. I say "free" because you don't have to pay, but there is a $6 parking fee included on your ticket.

Then there are all these non-venue lots that charge $20 - $25. You see these before you see the "free" ones (and they are open much earlier). So when you are thinking about getting in some nice tailgaiting time, you have a choice to make. Do I suck it up and spend the extra $ so I get in an extra 1/2 or so or tailgaiting (plus get out of there quicker later)? or do I wait in traffic and go to the "free" lots (which I think, correct me if I'm wrong - didn't open until around 6)? some of these non-venue lots are also a significant (~10 min) walk to the ticket window.

so again, tough choices. with work and traffic, if you went to one of the non-venue lots, you would have had to have forfieted your whole tailgaiting time because it would have taken you 10 mins to walk over there, 20-30 mins to wait in line, 10 mins to walk back to your car and then ANOTHER 10 to walk back to go in. tailgaiting is not just fun but cost-efficient as well - considering the prices of beers inside. there are no bars around the Dodge like there are at many other places either. it's the parking lot or inside, period.

so what you have is a situation where people who have been to tons of shows and never had any real ticket pick-up problems say, if I get on line at 8, and PJ takes the stage at 9:15, there is no way it will take and hour and 15 mins. so they either go to one of the non-venue lots that are far away, or the "free" lots that don't open up until pretty late in the afternoon. either way, that's a ton of people waiting until 7:30 / 8 ish to get in line. And all for reasons that legitimately make sense.

I, unlike many others, have had 10C ticket pick-up problems in the past. so I get on line as early as humanly possible. in this case it meant giving up an hour of tailgaiting and spending probably $50 for beer inside all told. But I wouldn't have enjoyed myself anyway without the peace of mind of having my tickets in hand.

So I got in line around 6:45. The line was slow but moving. When I got into the 10C ticket fenced-in area, there were NO alpha break-outs of the lines. I have never seen this before. the Dodge center employees were taking members ID's to the back and getting the tix from the 10c employees. I got my tix about 7:15. Not a problem but not terrificly smooth either.

My buddy and I then went to meet some other friends, and by 8pm we started to go in. I obviously noticed the 10C line and was astounded.

So...what I think happened was, around 7:30 - 7:45 the 10C employees, based on experience, noticed that there were still a TON of tix left to distribute. Since the line was moving pretty slow as it was, they probably said to the Dodge people, look - unless you want a real mess on your hands, just listen to us and let us do the alpha-break out lines. this probably resulted in a 10 - 15 minute arguement/discussion and when decided on prob took another 15 - 20 mins to impliment. this change in tactics, which obviously happened since people after this time are reporting there WERE alpha-sorted lines, obviously slowed things down to a crawl. Compound that with all of the people who got in line later than they normally would care to - it was the friggin perfect storm.

mostly the venue's fault - for the natural set-up of it, the parking retardedness, and them not listening to the 10C on the best way to do it until it was too late.

again...all fine to be angry, but unless you took off from work and picked up tickets at around 2 then you really cant complain. I took days off from work for Both MSG and Both Mansfield and already had the day off for Hartford...I made the arrangements so I wouldnt get screwed. I was at Gor1 in 06 and the line was insane as well...all you can do is make sure it doesnt happen to u again. If you have to work or cant get there when ticket window opens at 2...then fine...we all know life gets in the way sometimes, but you cant blame the venue for that...sometimes this stuff happens...its on u to make sure you dont get screwed again.

Bada Bing Crosby wrote:

right...they did it ONLY for us. it has NOTHING to do with the millions of dollars that were generated on this mini tour. :rolleyes: gimme a break!

never said that-thats what bonaroo was about
but they put together the rest of the tour for the fans-and the money yes-but if it was all about money the tix would have been $150 like uncle neil

my point was that they dont owe you anything except to play live for your ticket price
you pays your money and takes your chances-like every other freaking band

Its not 10c's fault, not the band's fault, not the fans fault. Its the venue's management. They have a bad will call / 10c / entrance layout and their staff moves like molasses.

At the window, once presented an ID, the staff spent approx. 3 minutes retreiving each fans tickets. If you are 10 back in line, thats 30+ minutes! Their system was to take your ID, walk back to a side room, rummage through a single tray of thousands of envelopes to find yours, walk back and have you sign the envelope. At 7:15pm, with 5 windows open each with 9 people in each line, the wait was 25 mins, and I thought that was bad. When I got out at 7:45, the line grew to hundreds.

I have been a member since 1994-ish and got limited view seats, as well. I know the 10Club has to deal with the venue, radio stations, etc., but I would so much rather be several rows back and in the center, than WAY off to the side with a limited view but closer to the stage. This is the second Hartford show I have been to and had almost the exact same seats both times. Again, 10 club members have so provent their allegiance to this amazing band and should not have a limited view!!!

I had one thought about this - remember someone posted who felt their real 10club tickets had been switched out and they got really bad seats? (I don't remember which show, but I think he said no one around him/her was 10 club, and they thought maybe someone in the venue staff did it) I wonder if the 10 Club switched to keeping control of the tickets and handing them to venue staff to prevent venue staff from doing anything wrong with the tickets.

I am actually amazed (and grateful) that they do so well - thousands of us place our order, then we go to the show, and sure enough our tickets are there, waiting in little envelopes for us. That's a lot to organize and keep track of.

Jeanwah wrote:

Sheesh, guys, so a combination of shit happened all at once, turned the 10c ticket retrieval into a mess, and we're going to sit here and point fingers. Really, the only thing we can do at this point (besides the bitching!) is write the 10 club about the problem, write Dodge about the problem, swear to ourselves to always be at least two hours early for the show, and expect that shit happens from time to time, like a huge rush of people showing up at the ticket window at once.

Shit happens, move on, make changes to make sure this doesn't happen again. Simple as that. If the problem was partly Dodge or 10 club, then they should make changes to ensure it doesn't happen again. And that starts with us telling them directly, not in a fan forum.

how would we collectively know that the problem even existed if we didin't discuss it in this forum?

the benefit of the forum is to try to figure out what happened. Many, many people were originally blaming the 10 club alone. if we didn't have this forum to discuss it, a ton of people would go on thinking that it was their fault entirely, which, I think the evidence shows, would have been wrong. In terms of "pointing fingers", people want to figure out who was at fault so they can effectively address it with the right parties.

ElderlyWoman19 wrote:

no alpha sorted line at MSG 1 this year...just random windows for those who were lined up for over an hour from 2-3pm while MSG had no idea what to do either...again...stop blaming venues and if you try to get their at 2...even if you wait in line for 6 hours....you still see all of Pearl Jam

OK, so if "MSG had no idea what to do either", why shouldn't one blame the venue? is it not a venue's responsibility to service their patrons? I'm pretty sure they get a sizeable chuck of the ticket sales / parking

what IS a venue and it's employees responsible for? Making sure the lights are on? that the roof doesn't fall in? that there is running water? that's it?