By Mike JohnstonPrior to tickets going on sale to the public, the Ultimate Fighting Championship has eclipsed its ticket sales record, as the company sold over 42,000 tickets for UFC 129 during the first day of its pre-sale. With this, the UFC has broken the previous North American MMA ticket sales record of 23,152 set at UFC 124 in Montreal this past December. The UFC is ecstatic over how quickly tickets were sold, however, many fans were left disgruntled, feeling they did not have a fair chance at purchasing tickets for the April 30 event at Rogers Centre.
In order to take advantage of the pre-sale, fans had to be a member of the UFC Fight Club, which costs nearly $90 Canadian to join. Regardless, many fans decided to purchase a Fight Club membership for the sole purpose of ensuring they would get UFC 129 tickets. Still, at the end of the day, scores of fans were left empty-handed and irate.
“I know beggars can’t be choosers, but I find it really disappointing that after spending $90 on a membership, I wasn’t able to secure tickets to UFC 129,” said Travis Thomson from Toronto. “I only bought the [expletive] membership to attend this event, and it’s not like I procrastinated. I was online right after they went on sale and couldn’t find anything.”
UFC Director of Canadian Operations Tom Wright said that within the first few minutes of sales more seats had been added, but within an hour there were only sparse single seats remaining.
“I honestly find it hard to believe they sold that many tickets that fast,” said Jim Garner, another disgruntled Ontarian. “I think the UFC needs to monitor who buys tickets during pre-sales. It is so obvious that scalpers purchased the majority of tickets. Just look at all the ticket websites selling them off. Also, the prices of the seats to begin with were laughable and insulting. Far worse than a Maple Leaf game.”
In fact, many websites including Stubhub.com were selling tickets at inordinate values later that day. As of at 5 p.m. ET on February 11, Stubhub.com had 1664 tickets for sale. Several tickets with an original value of $800 were listed as costing upwards of $40,000.
Another reason fans are voicing their displeasure is the fact roughly 11,500 tickets were set aside prior to the pre-sale itself. During a media scrum following the UFC’s Toronto press conference on February 8, UFC President Dana White had the following to say:
“[UFC 129] is going to be insane. Let me just give you an example. There’s a girl who works for us in our office and what she does is, friends and family and all these people call in and they request tickets, to buy tickets through her, you know, before they go on sale. She has already sold 11,500 tickets herself. You know what she normally does? She does like 300, 500 tickets. 11,500 tickets have been sold through one of the girls that works in my office.”
This isn't sitting well with the majority of fans who couldn't get tickets. “Listen, I’ve been watching the UFC since 1993. I’m a huge fan, but I’m your average guy, not rolling in cash,” said Graham Gordon from Etobikoke, Ontario. “I’ve got a family to feed and bills to pay and I can’t afford to spend even $90 on a special [Fight Club] membership just to buy tickets early. I was saving up my money to buy a couple nosebleed seats, but now I don’t have that chance and it’s disappointing. I’m a huge fan of them, but I think the UFC let down its local fans on this one.”
A limited number of tickets were released for the second day of pre-sales, but were gone within four minutes. The UFC has stated that the general public will have the opportunity to purchase a limited number of tickets on Saturday, February 12. They have also said that there is the possibility of adding additional seats closer to the event date.
For more info and updates on UFC 129 follow @MikeyJ_MMA on Twitter.
No comments:
Post a Comment