Team Bieber boasted that tickets for Justin Bieber's Madison Square Garden concert sold out in just 30 seconds, while his entire American "Believe" tour sold out in just an hour. However, ticketing documents obtained by News Channel 5 Investigates reveal shocking new details.
“Bieber's fans were not told that there were really not that many seats left by the time tickets went on sale to the general public,” reports News Channel 5, in Nashville. “Ticket instructions obtained from Bieber's Nashville concert show that out of almost 14,000 available seats the number actually set aside for that public on sale: just 1,001 … In Bieber's case, the biggest chunk of tickets -- almost 6,000 -- went to American Express customers through an AmEx presale. Another 3,000 went to paying members of Bieber's fan club.”
In the investigation, News Channel 5 says that it found 14 tickets on TicketsNow (a resale site with a huge markup) in row G, listed for $246 each. Ticketing documents show that this entire row consisted of house seats that were not made available to the general public.
“A lot of artists do this,” one concert insider tells me. “Their perspective is they would rather make the money than give it to scalpers. It's not unusual to hold back the best seats and sell them at marked-up prices calling them 'VIP' tickets.”
News Channel 5 claims that three years ago, less than 1,600 seats out of 15,000 seats at Taylor Swift's tour went on sale for the general public, adding that Ticketmaster has no say in what tickets artists make available for sale.
Bieber’s publicist did not return our calls for comment.
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