Tennessee joins DOJ lawsuit against Live Nation, Ticketmaster: Here's what to know
In 2022, Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti's office took on Ticketmaster after chaos erupted when fans tried to buy pre-sale tickets for Taylor Swift. Now, the ticketing company is facing a lawsuit from the Department of Justice and even more states.
Tennessee is one of 29 states, Washington, D.C. and now the Justice Department that are part of a lawsuit against Live Nation Entertainment, the parent company of Ticketmaster, alleging it monopolized live events. Skrmetti praised the move by the DOJ to move ahead with the suit on Thursday.
“Since Ticketmaster’s Taylor Swift ticketing debacle in 2022, my AG colleagues and I have relentlessly sought justice for Americans wanting to attend concerts without having their pocketbooks pillaged by Live Nation’s monopoly,” Skrmetti said in a statement. “I will continue to fight on behalf of the artists, venues, and concertgoers in Tennessee, and I am glad to partner with the DOJ in the bipartisan effort to break up the Live Nation/Ticketmaster monopoly.”
The lawsuit seeks to lower prices for fans and open venue doors to more musicians.
What does the lawsuit allege?
The lawsuit alleges the company’s “flywheel” strategy captures fees and revenue from concert fans and sponsorships, pours the revenue into signing artists to exclusive promotion deals and wields the cache of artists to sign venues into exclusive, long-term ticketing deals.
The fees Ticketmaster charges for concerts can be staggering. For example, a 2022 Red Hot Chili Peppers show at Bank of America Stadium in Charlotte, N.C. had per-ticket fees of $25.75, plus $3.49 for processing, meaning one concert-goer would pay $29.24, an additional 36% of the original $81.50 ticket cost.
On Thursday, U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland said that dominance allowed the company to exert control over the live-events industry in a way that hurt fans, performers, smaller promoters and venue operators. The company uses outdated technology that deprives fans of ticketing information, according to the federal lawsuit filed in New York.
Allegations in the lawsuit include:
Retaliating against potential competitors.
Locking out competitors by signing venues into long-term contracts that block rival ticket sellers or ticketing technology. Ticketmaster’s exclusive agreements cover more than 70% of concert ticket sales at major concert venues.
Restricting artist access to venues by owning or controlling access to the locations.
Live Nation's reaction
In a statement, Live Nation and Ticketmaster said the bulk of ticket fees go to venues and competition has eroded Ticketmaster’s market share. The companies said their 1.4% annual profit reflects the “opposite of monopoly power.”
“The DOJ's lawsuit won't solve the issues fans care about relating to ticket prices, service fees, and access to in-demand shows,” the statement said. “We will defend against these baseless allegations, use this opportunity to shed light on the industry, and continue to push for reforms that truly protect consumers and artists.”
Taylor Swift, Ticketmaster chaos and bots
The 2022 incident in Tennessee regarding the Taylor Swift tickets was among several incidents that Ticketmaster and its parent company were already embroiled in.
At the time, Ticketmaster blamed online bots, specialized computer software used by ticket scalpers, for briefly crashing its website and causing the company to ultimately cancel its general public ticket sale for Swift's tour. This led to questions of how laws put in place to help combat these bots were actually being enforced.
The 2016 Better Online Ticket Sales Act, or BOTS Act, co-sponsored by U.S. Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tennessee, when she was a member of the U.S. House of Representatives, is meant to combat the use of bots to buy tickets in droves on online retailers for the purpose of reselling them at inflated prices.
In 2022, Blackburn and U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Connecticut, sent the Federal Trade Commission a letter asking what was being done about bots and how was the BOTS Act was being enforced.
“The recent difficulties consumers have faced while attempting to purchase tickets is a serious concern and reflective of anti-competitive conduct in the online ticket marketplace,” Blackburn said in a statement in 2022. “Fortunately, a solution is already in place that would go a long way in reducing ticket costs and protecting consumers and artists from scammers."
What states are part of the Live Nation, Ticketmaster lawsuit?
Along with the DOJ and Tennessee here are the other states taking part:
Arizona
Arkansas
California
Colorado
Connecticut
District of Columbia
Florida
Illinois
Maryland
Massachusetts
Michigan
Minnesota
Nevada
New Hampshire
New Jersey
New York
North Carolina
Ohio
Oklahoma
Oregon
Pennsylvania
Rhode Island
South Carolina
Texas
Virginia
Washington
West Virginia
Wisconsin
Wyoming
Who owns Ticketmaster, Live Nation?
Live Nation and Ticketmaster merged in 2010 to become Live Nation Entertainment, which is a publicly traded company.
The CEO and president of the company is Michael Rapino, who has been in charge of it since 2005 and helped oversee the merger of the two companies, per Live Nation's website.
What does Live Nation do in Tennessee?
Live Nation is the the dominant ticket and content provider for venues in Tennessee. According to the Attorney General's office, Live Nation controls two parts of Tennessee’s live entertainment industry: ticketing and tours.
Between 2019 and 2022, Tennesseans spent over $765 million on Ticketmaster tickets, according to the press release from Skrmetti's office.
This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Live Nation, Ticketmaster DOJ lawsuit: What to know in Tennessee
