Caesars now in the ticket/event business?

I received an email on Sunday that you can now buy tickets to concerts and sport events through a Total Reserves ticket service. And there are concerts, games, events all over the country that are not connected to any casino.

The email said in part:

No matter how hard tickets are to find, TR Live Events has the tickets you want. And for a limited time, earn 3X Reward Credits when you purchase tickets to your favorite game, concert or show. Simply purchase your tickets through TR Live Events before September 30, 2014, and you'll earn 3X Reward Credits for every $1 spent.

For live events all over North America, you can earn and redeem Reward Credits for ticket purchases. From the hottest concert tours and theatre shows to football, baseball, basketball and hockey, TR Live Events has you covered.

See: https://totalrewards.fanxchange.com/

Anyone know more?

I just looked at this but it's hard to use their site on an iPhone.

Will investigate more later, but it seems they are tied into a ticket broker database (very common these days for many agencies to sell the same tickets), and probably mark the prices way up for RCs.

Will verify later and post more about what I find.

Okay, I just examined it some more.

This is an absolutely brutal, awful, terrible, horrible value.

Even CET should be embarrassed about this abomination.

First off, the website is terrible. It is incompatible with iPhones, and even when on a laptop, it defaults to "Earn RCs, 0 available" (which is TR speak for "Sell your existing tickets") instead of "Redeem RCs" (which means "Buy tickets").

So as a test, I went to look up the San Francisco Giants versus LA Dodgers at Dodger Stadium for 9/22.

First it defaults to "Earn RCs" and says 0 available. So most people will close it right there, thinking there are zero tickets to buy there (ironically, doing themselves a favor!)

In reality, there are 5,976 tickets available, but you have to click "Redeem RCs" to see them.

Then the page freezes for awhile, as it's loading a list of 5976 tickets onto one screen (not even joking).

There is a clickable map of the stadium where you can examine tickets for a certain section, so I did that.

I took a look at Field Level Aisle 12.

For those unfamiliar with Dodger Stadium, Field Level Aisle 12 is a good aisle, as it's between home plate and third base, not blocked by the foul screen, and of course you are on the bottom level so you are close to the action.

The rows on that aisle are the following:

A-F: These are the "VIP" seats, as they are the first 6 rows. There are about 7 rows still ahead of "A" in a different section called "The Dugout Club", but obviously these are still great seats.

G-X: These are considered "MVP" seats. Rows G-N are still pretty good, though you're starting to get a lot farther back than rows A-F. However, once you get to row O, you are already a bit too far back for the seats to be worth all that much, and starting with about row R, you are under an awful "overhang" of the level above you, so it both restricts your view of fly balls and also just feels weird when you're supposed to be in an open air stadium. Row X is the worst, as you are completely under the overhang, and almost sitting in the hallway.

A lot of poorly informed Dodgers fans buy the dreaded row X from the secondary ticket market (for way too much money), not realizing how awful it is.

But let's talk prices.

TR Live Events has the following tickets for Aisle 12:

Row X: 42,500 RCs ($425)
Row B: 53,305 RCs ($533.05)
Row B: 57,475 RCs ($574.75)

Sounds expensive, right?

You don't know the half of it.

Let's take a look at cheaptickets.com, which despite the name "cheap", is just a standard ticket broker with very standard prices. This is the type of site you look at when you're trying to figure out if you're getting a good deal on StubHub.

You will find virtually the same Aisle 12, row B ticket for $160!

StubHub features Aisle 12, row B for $171.50.

StubHub has no fees, so it's possible cheaptickets has some fees and they break out the same. I didn't bother going through the motions.

But you get the point.

These tickets are marked up by more than 3x.

Just to make sure Aisle 12 wasn't an anomaly, I clicked around the stadium and saw ridiculous prices everywhere.

Now, keep in mind that TR Live isn't selling 5,976 tickets on its own. I'm 100% sure of that. They are plugged into some shared ticket broker database, and then mark up the price by several times, figuring idiot gamblers will be excited to get "comped tickets" and won't bother doing the math.

Basically these ticket broker databases work by giving everyone access to the same tickets, charging them a fixed price when they sell, and the individual broker makes the difference in whatever they can sell them for. So if the database makes the ticket available to me (the ticket broker) for $80 and I sell it for $140, I make $60. And if I can find a sucker to buy it for $500, I make $420. That's why you see the same tickets at so many brokers, but for different prices.

Other ticket brokers actually list StubHub tickets, and then buy those tickets themselves and mark up the price.

Anyway, I can't figure out which database or databases TR Live is drawing from, but they are definitely marking up the prices huge.

I can understand a small markup, because you're playing with RCs instead of cash, but this is outrageous.

The problem here is that CET is being so obnoxious with the markup that even a rather clueless ticket shopper will probably pause and wonder if he's being gouged. So why even bother doing this? So they can get a few idiots to blow RCs at poor value? It will end up doing far more harm than good, as most people will see the prices and get pissed.

This reminds me of the awful travel company they partnered with last year ("TR Getaways"), which was misleading and terrible. You can read about this here: http://vegascasinotalk.com/forum/showth...11-Tr-getaways

I think CET's problem is that they underestimate their customer base, assuming them all to be idiots.