Hundreds of tickets for a concert by Twenty One Pilots at the Algonquin Commons Theatre were bought by scalpers Oct. 2, the day they went on sale.
The Ottawa Sun exposed the story hours later.
Twenty One Pilots, a big name in electropop music, is coming to the college April 1 and was supposed to be an affordable way for students to celebrate the end of the school year.
But as soon as tickets were released, they sold out in minutes and started appearing on third party websites at significantly higher costs.
“Having a show sell out and create demand for an act is a good thing”, said Kenneth MacLeod, the manager of theatre operations and hospitality services.
“Having tickets sit in scalpers hands, and not filling the seats on show night is a bad thing for everyone.”
Even as of Oct. 20, tickets range from $95 to $500 on sites such as StubHub.
Tickets were originally sold for $29.50 to $34.50, at prices students can afford.
Nothing has been has been done to rectify this or prevent the issue from happening again. But MacLeod is confident that this is just a fluke and will not happen in the future.
“The venue hasn’t really experienced problems with scalping in the past and I don’t anticipate it will be a regular event here in the future,” said MacLeod.
He also said that Live Nation and Ticketmaster, the companies that hold the events and sell tickets at Algonquin, aren’t speaking about the scalping.