People Bother Me...

I work at a venue that hosts a variety of events - concerts, trade shows, ice shows, touring broadway shows, sporting events - football, basketball, rodeo, motor sport events (indoor dirt and snow racing), etc... This facility was the first one of it's size in this region with the next closest venue of this size (or larger) more than 300 miles away. For the first 10 years this facility was the only place around that could host the events I listed above. Within the past 4 years several other similiar venues have popped up around the region, no longer giving us a monopoly on events that wanted to get exposure in the upper midwest.

The venue I work at is like most in America. It was funded by the taxpayers. The difference between the venue I work at and a vast majority of other venues is that our venue has never finished a year in the red, over 12 years now. Most publicly owned venues are more than likely losing money on the events they host but the public often does not care because the economic impact a venue has is considerable. So using this as a lead-in, here's why I begin with that preface.

Part of my job responbilities is to receive and reply to most general questions that are sent to our facility via email. Without any question probably the #1 'complaint' that is sent to us is that we are not getting Paul McCartney, AC/DC, The Rolling Stones, Britney Spears, Backstreet Boys, Pearl Jam or whomever you would like to insert there. 80% of those emails are easily dismissed as the act is not touring, so how would you expect our venue to be able to book an act such as they want when the act themselves isn't even performing - just pointing out some of the masterminds behind these emails. Then you have the ones that will comment that U2 is playing in Chicago, why aren't they playing here? Easy again, huge acts (and you could actually substitute the word huge with greedy) will not even consider going to a secondary market - which is what we are considered. Just because U2 is selling out 5 shows in Chicago and Minneapolis doesn't mean they are going to stop in nowhere North Dakota to make 10% of the money they could doing just one show in a large city. And finally we have the emails that come from people that think that some obscure or upcoming act would sell out our venue because it is their favorite band and not only would they come to the show, but so would everyone they know...yet these acts would have a tough time selling out club or sub-5,000 seat venue even in the larger cities.

What frustrates me the most is trying to tactifully tell these people that they are stupid. First and foremost for a venue to land an event the event itself has got to want to perform there. Yes, we would love to have some guaranteed 'ringers' perform at our venue but why would they? Again, landing an act that sells out everywhere (which are fewer than ever) why would they choose to come to nowhere, ND to make less money than if they stayed on the east and west coasts and even the larger metro areas in between? It would make no sense for them other than to broaden their fan base, but if they are selling out shows everywhere they go, odds are they have a very broad fan base already and their fans are willing to travel to see them.

What has really devalued the concert industry is the casinos. At one time we could attract the 'mid-level' entertainers. Acts that are established and have good fan support, but may no longer be putting out albums or have had member changes within the band or just no longer at the top, but still a popular act. Casinos will gladly hand over a respectable amount of cash for these acts to come out and play 2 shows a night at about an hour, hour and a half in length. These casino acts could have continued to play venues at a cheap ticket price and make a fair amount of money - but with no guarantees...the casino gig is a guarantee. So now you've essentially eliminated every act from the 80's. The casino's in this region have had Cheap Trick, Styx, Firehouse, REO Speedwagon, 38 Special, Eddie Money, etc... all acts that sure, would probably not sell out even the venue I work at, but now have essentially devalued themselves. These acts will also play at fairs and festivals but why pay that $30 or $40 ticket at a fair when you can get a comp ticket to see them at a casino?

To top things off, you factor in the fact that there just isn't that many big name acts anymore. I think it is sad when Paul McCartney, Simon And Garfunkel and The Rolling Stones are among the top grossing concerts any year they tour. Especially when you look at some of their ticket prices! How long can the Stones continue to charge over $100 to see them and who are the morons that continue to pay that? Current, popular acts just don't have the widespread appeal that AC/DC of the 80's had. Music has gotten so fragmented and diversified that you could probably look through 10 different people's cd library and the likelihood of all 10 people having the same cd that is currently popular is probably unlikely. Just because you like 50 Cent doesn't mean I even know who he is. But 15 years ago, even the acts that I didn't care for I usually have at least heard of and probably some of their music.

And, as I started this whole article out with, this venue hasn't lost money in it's entire history but one way to do so is to start offering an exborant guarantee to acts to perform at a venue and then not being able to recoup those funds when the event is held, which is typical of many venues. I guess in summary, what really bothers me is that people will often fire off an angry email to us as to why our venue is unable to get the concerts they would like to see without even knowing the basic logistics of the business itself, yet in my community the 'bottomline' of this venue is often the main concern for many rather than the type of events we host, so we have yet another factor that comes into play for our particular venue. So either we could begin to host every concert that even came close to this region and make 1/2 the people of this region happy but then the other 1/2 would begin to complain that their hard earned tax-paying dollars are being wasted to fund a concert that wouldn't fill up a large bar...we just can't win and people bother me....