Fans of Taylor Swift have been running into trouble at ticket exchanges, but several so-called “Swifties” are shaking off high fees and providing a “Love Story” for fellow fans.
What Happened: Swift’s current Eras Tour has seen sky-high demand as it is the first tour from the successful singer in five years.
The demand for tickets caused problems for Ticketmaster, which is owned by Live Nation Entertainment.
Fans have been shelling out thousands of dollars on ticket resellers like StubHub for Swift’s latest tour. To get around high ticket prices, one fan even took a job as a security officer at one of Swift’s concert.
Three Swifties may now have the perfect solution for fans looking to avoid purchasing tickets on the reseller market.
Twitter account @ErasTourResell is a volunteer effort from Courtney Johnston, Channette Garay, and Angel Richards. The trio have helped over 3,000 people get tickets to Swift’s concerts, according to the Wall Street Journal.
In an effort to fight against ticket resellers who are exploiting the demand for Swift’s shows, the trio has connected sellers and buyers on Twitter by using a Google Form and taking steps that validate the tickets. Sellers have to agree to sell the tickets at face value.
“We’re just trying to help (keep) people from getting scammed. Our favorite part is when we’re all at the shows and people come up to us and they’ll be like, ‘I’m here because of you,’” Richards told the publication.
Some of the tickets have come from Ticketmaster, which has released last-minute tickets to the public, and from Swift fans who have bought tickets to sell to other fellow fans.
The @ErasTourResell account doesn’t sell the tickets itself, and the trio said they do not make any money for their middleman services.
Despite not making money, the trio spend around 40 hours weekly running the Twitter account. The trio is also in two different time zones, with Johnston living in San Francisco and Garay and Richards living in Connecticut.
“We’re insanely committed,” Garay told the Wall Street Journal. “The other day, for Gillette (Stadium), there was a submission for two floor seats, and we literally pulled over on a random street, put our hazards on. We were like, we have to get this posted right now.”
Johnston got the idea for the exchange after seeing few fans successful in getting presale tickets. Johnston tweeted that she wanted to create an exchange offering tickets at face value and saw huge interest from fans.
Why It’s Important: The efforts from the three Swifties come at a time when Ticketmaster has faced criticism by members of Congress and President Joe Biden over its high fees and accusations that the marketplace caters to resellers rather than to fans.
“Ticketmaster has honestly only gotten worse and worse,” Richards told the Wall Street Journal.
A love of Taylor Swift connected the three fans across social media and has now led to a strong offline friendship, according to the publication. Johnston, Garay, and Richards have all reportedly seen Swift at least eight times, with Johnston estimating that she’s been to at least 20 concerts.
Live Nation Entertainment saw shares drop after experiencing outages and upset fans once Swift concert tickets went on sale.
For Swift’s concert stops in Detroit on June 9 and June 10, the cheapest seats are listed at $1,603 and $1,408 each on StubHub.
This content was originally published here.
