 You know all the reasons why being a season seat holder is amazing. It's the money. It's the cloud. It's the experience. You get all that good stuff. But there's also a dark side to being a season seat holder, especially if you're trying to make some money reselling those seats. And we're going to talk all about that right now. What's up, guys? Welcome back. My name is Shreds. Here on Thumbs Up, we're going to talk about buying tickets, selling tickets, and making sure that you have all the fun with your tickets. Today, we're talking all about reselling season seats and how there is a dark side to it, how there's a lot of negatives associated with it, and why it's not all sun shines and rainbows when you think about making that money selling those season seats. We've got four main topics to discuss about the dark side of reselling season seats, and we're going to talk all about it right now. Number one, seats matter. Where your seat is actually located in the venue has a big impact on being able to potentially make money reselling season tickets. Not all seats are created equally within the venue, and many of the most sought-after seats have already been taken up by long-standing season seat holders who have been with the teams for 5, 10, 20, 30 plus years, and those seats just aren't available to the general public anymore. Teams will release their seating maps across the venues. They'll say, oh, we got some cheap seats up here in the fan zone. We've got some great lower bowl center section seats over here, and we've got these very expensive premium seats in the club zone that you can always buy for however much money they're asking for. But just because the seat is available doesn't mean that it's going to be profitable. For example, in NFL, if seats in the lower bowl open up for sale for season seat holders, it may seem like, oh, that's a great idea. I want to go buy some lower bowl seats. I know people love sitting down in the lower bowl, make a ton of money, sell it for millions of dollars, and just dance around in all the money because I'm just, you know, I'm just a baller now at this point. Not so fast. Lower bowls, they are separated within their different zones, within each venue, with each team, with each league, and not all lower bowl seats are created equally. Yes, there's going to be a demand and premium for those center section seats, but sometimes those center section seats, they may only be selling them as club seats. So you have the season seat price plus you have an additional club benefit access price point that you need to add on to your seats so you can actually get access to buy those seats. So that $100 per game ticket price is now a $200 or $300 per game ticket price. It adds up very, very quickly. And so those seats, while they may seem like they are, you know, a great investment, could actually end up hurting you in the long run because someone might only be willing to spend $150 or $200 on those seats, and you're paying $300 for that ticket. You're losing a lot of money really, really fast. Teams will release out a seating map across the venue saying, oh, we got seats over here, seats over here, seats over here and all these different price points. And then when you go to actually try and buy those seats, oh, there's nothing available. Where did they all go? Well, just because the seating map says those seats existed at that price point. Unfortunately, those seats have already been purchased by all previous season seat holders in the past because of that great deal. Toronto Raptors, they have fan zones in the upper bowl and the lower bowl fan zone tickets sometimes are as cheap as $25 or less per game. Average resell prices for Raptors are well over $50 per game, so you're seeing quite a huge markup on those seats. There is huge value to being a season seat holder sitting in a fan zone seated section. However, those seats just don't come available anymore because they've all been purchased by season seat holders. Season seat holders or with a team generally get access to buy additional season seats prior to releasing new ones to the general public. So if you are a season seat holder already and have been there for, you know, two, five, 10, 20, 30 plus years, you're going to get access to buying these seats before everybody else. So when it comes around to that renewal season, they say, hey, by the way, some seats opened up, are you interested in upgrading, adding, moving into this new section? The answer is generally going to be yes. And just because they move doesn't mean they release the old seat. Sometimes they just hold on to the old ones plus add the new ones and just keep adding to their portfolio. So all those prime seats in both prime locations as well as prime price points are generally gone prior to anyone else being able to start buying those seats in the future. Therefore, when you are going in trying to start up buying some season seats to buy and resell, sometimes the seats that are left just aren't that great. So remember that when you're trying to buy some new season seats to resell that location matters a ton. The seats matter a ton. And if your options are limited, it may not be the best potential option for you if you're looking to make some money right away. Again, that's not to say you can't make money on them. No, I'm not saying that, but it's just it's it's a very risky proposition, especially at the beginning if you're only able to pick across certain few selections that are available. Number two, the team matters. What league are they in? What city are they playing in? How are they doing in the standings? All these things play a huge impact on whether you'll actually make money reselling season seats or not. If you're playing in a small market city, it's possible that you may have an added advantage of that being the only professional sports team that's there. And so there's a huge demand for those games or those tickets to be able to actually attend. But it's also possible in reverse. If they are in a small town, it's possible that the team may not have that big of a following. And they may also just, you know, if they're not very good, people just may not show up at all. And that can really hurt your ticket sales in the future. So there are a lot of factors playing in just within the market. Also, the league is a very important matter in this. Not all teams are equivalent, not all leagues are equivalent, and they will all have their own intricacies and differences when trying to resell those season seats. An MLB season, for example, 81 home games a season, you're not going to make a ton of money on most games because there's just too many useless terrible games. It's not going to be a pretty sight for you if that's what you're expecting to happen. If you're in an NFL market, not all seats are equivalent to those in NHL MLB seating. They're all different in terms of where people actually want to sit when they're going to different games. For hockey games, people love sitting center bowl, right on the glass, anything in those center sections. NFL, people love sitting lower bowl as well center sections, but they don't want to be too low to the bottom because then they can't actually see anything. You got to be in the middle tiers of the lower bowl to get those best vantage points. MLB games, same idea. You want to be right behind home plate and then potentially even up in the upper bowl, right behind home plate because that's where the best views are. But every now and then you might actually want to be in the outfield where all the home runs get hit around the foul pool line. There's so many different facets within each team, each market, each league. They're all different. So you need to realize if you've been buying NHL tickets in the past and now you want to use that expertise towards NFL tickets, it's not going to be the same idea. Yes, there are some similarities that will occur, but that doesn't necessarily translate one to one because pricing is different in each of the different leagues. So it's possible that you may be expecting the price to be cheaper in one section, but they end up being more expensive and vice versa. Because if you start targeting the wrong seats, it's very easy to start making a lot of mistakes and those mistakes can cost you a lot of money. Teams that suck are also a huge factor. Well, I think you kind of get the idea there. If a team sucks, there generally isn't a huge demand for those seats. And as a result, if you do own those season seats, it's not going to be a pretty sight for you. Trying to move those tickets can be very difficult, especially if there isn't any demand for those tickets. This falls back again into the location section. If you are buying season seats and you have seats in some poor locations across the venue and the team starts to suck, it's going to be a long, long road for you to try and unload all those season tickets. The flip side of that, if a team is a contender year after year after year qualified for the playoffs, you may be thinking, oh yeah, this team is amazing. They always make the playoffs, they always make deep playoff runs. They must be hugely profitable and popular. But is that really the case? Because one of two things can happen. One, as a team continues their long run success of making it into the playoffs, going deep into the playoffs, potentially even winning a championship, it's possible that those teams will realize that, hey, we have a lot of people coming to these games. Let's start increasing the prices year after year after year because we keep winning. So getting into becoming a season seat member later in the game becomes a lot more expensive. The margin become a lot thinner and it's very likely you're going to start losing money right away because you bought into a price point that is much higher than the average season seat holder who's been there longer than you. The other flip side is teams that make the playoffs year after year after year, those cities sometimes, they start to get fatigued because they're like, hey, this team, they make the playoffs every year. I'm not as excited as I was five, six, seven years ago when they were first making the playoffs. I think I'm just going to pass on it, watch it on TV, maybe spend my money somewhere else. There's a few other things I can be doing with that money and the actual demand for those events, those tickets, they can dry up a lot faster than you may expect. Just because a team makes the playoffs doesn't mean they're going to be a hugely profitable team. Number three, being local matters. I've stressed this already in previous videos. If you are local to the market where you are buying those season seats, it helps you tremendously, but a lot of times you can't be in every single market all the time. It just isn't possible. And as a result, not being local means you're going to have to try and sell these tickets yourself either through your own personal means, through your own connections, or you're going to have to start going on online marketplaces and start paying those heavy, heavy commissions and fees to actually get those tickets sold. That means last minute tickets might not be that profitable. Competition will be a lot tougher just because you're not competing with everybody else who has these tickets online. There's a lot of factors working against you if you're not local to that market where you're buying those season tickets. Again, it's not to say that you can't make money reselling season tickets not being local. However, you have an added advantage if you are. So if you're not local, you have a lot more competition and a lot fewer options to be able to unload those seats. So one point, and that is point number four, being a broker matters. If you're identified as a broker, one of two things can happen to you. One, if you're identified as a broker, a team can simply adjust your season seat price. MLSE is famous for doing this. The past couple of years, they have started to identify brokers who are reselling their season seats for a profit as a business. And as a result, they are increasing the price for those brokers on their tickets, as well as cutting all other benefits on those season seats. So no pre-sale access to purchase additional tickets, no concert access, no discount on food and beverage, no additional playoff tickets, no nothing for those brokers. Brokers, they're feeling the pinch because they're being told, Hey, if you want to continue buying these tickets for profit, we're not going to make it easy for you. We're going to be upcharging you 25, 35, 45, 50% plus on your season seat package, just for the right to continue buying those seats year after year after year. If you're reselling seats as a business, that's really tough. If your margins are increasing by 50%, that's really, really tough. Every market works differently. And if you're running on very lean margins on your season tickets, this could be the thing that completely ruins the economics of actually reselling season tickets. So if you get identified as a broker, this is one of the huge risks that can happen to you with your season tickets. And I haven't gone to the worst one yet. Number two, if you get identified as a broker, the most common way that they are dealt with, they just cancel your seats. You could be a broker and reselling tickets for years, decades even. And then once the team starts doing well, they start making the playoffs, you're ready for that huge historic playoff run out of Chicago Cubs. And the Cubs can just come in and say, Hey, you're a broker. We don't want this kind of does go on our team. We're going to cut you no ifs ands or buts. This is a real problem. This is a serious, serious problem if you identified as a broker. And at the end of the day, there's almost nothing you can do about it. It's very clear in the terms conditions that if they identify you as a broker, they can simply just cancel your ability to renew your season tickets. They can potentially even cancel your tickets within the season itself. There are so many negatives being a season seat holder and being identified as a broker. If you are reselling season seats, then it almost makes it impossible to really make any money reselling season tickets. You think I'm kidding? Let me give you a few examples here. Pittsburgh Pirates, I've been a Pittsburgh Pirates season seat holder since 2014. Yes, I said that right, 2014. It's been a very, very long run with the pirates. I still hold them, but we're going to talk into numbers right here and now. Okay, 2014, I joined in when they were in the wildcard against the San Francisco Giants. I only bought two tickets for that playoff run. I spent a total of $36.68 and I made a profit of $171.35. Okay, then we roll into 2015 and I have two season tickets for that entire season. They again make the playoff. So all in all, I spent a total of $3,771.23. On that, I made a profit of $3,725.33. Now, if we get a running total of my cumulative Pittsburgh Pirates profits, we're now sitting at a cool $3,896.68. Put on the board. 2016 rolls around. I'm feeling good. I buy another two additional seats. I now have four of them. I spent a total of $13,660 on Pittsburgh Pirates season tickets. And this was the first of many years where they didn't make the playoffs. However, it wasn't all bad. I still managed to make a profit of $1,322.03. Added all together into the cumulative total, we're sitting at a nice $5,218.71. Then we roll into 2017. I'm feeling good. I've been making money even on a down year where they don't make the playoffs. I'm like, oh, what could possibly go wrong? I still hold on to four tickets again. I'm hoping rooting for them to make the playoffs. No such luck. What was my profit total that year? Negative $3,143.28. Running cumulative total at this point, $2,075.43 profit. So I'm thinking to myself, okay, what could possibly go wrong at this point? They've had it down year. They're going to come right back up, go back to the playoffs. I believe. How much did I believe? Six season tickets worth. I add another two tickets to my season C total, bringing my cost for 2018 to $15,793.30 cost. And how well did all my hoping and believing and praying do for me? Another down year, negative $2,528.18. Think about that, okay? Two down years in a row, I had been riding high at over 5,000 of cumulative profits from the Pirates and after 2018, negative $452.75. I'm down significant money, especially on the amount of money that I've been spending on these season seats, hoping, praying, expecting them to keep doing well and this is how I've been rewarded. Then 2019 rolls around, I change my strategy slightly. I say, oh, I know the solution. I know what happened. I added two seats and I lost money. So the solution is add two more seats, right? So I added two more seats. I now had eight of them. I had eight seats now at this point and I spent a total of $19,884.60. And what was my result of all that hard work? I made a profit of $2,849.21. That gave me a running total of $2,396.46 profit. So we're swinging up. We're swinging down. We're swinging back up again. It's a roller coaster ride out here. It's crazy. It's bonkers. It's wild and we're not done yet. Then we roll into 2020 and pandemic hits. Things go wonky. Things go sideways. So my total cost is zero. My total profit is zero and everything stays the same. So over the last six seasons, we've made about $2,000 but it was over 5,000 at one point. It was negative at another point. It's back up again. It's all over the place. So not being local, huge problem. Having seats on a team that isn't making the playoffs, huge problem. Being in a small market city, huge problem. Having seats in locations that may or may not be potentially viable, huge problem. I'm constantly having to tweak where my seats are, how many I want to hold, how much I want to spend, how much I'm selling them for, where I can sell them, how I can sell them, who I can sell them to. All these swings going on with the pirates and all these different factors playing into it, I've barely been able to turn a profit on these after six years. And I even started when they were still making the playoffs year after year. So I even had the added bonus of being able to join in as soon as that playoff run really got going. But if I had been a season seat holder even five years prior to that, it would have been a completely different story. Again, season seats are very, very fickle, very dangerous, very risky. So make sure you understand what you're getting yourself into prior to making that purchase. With all of that being said, are you still considering becoming a season seat holder to resell those season tickets? Let me know in the comments down below. I'm curious to hear what you guys think because as much as I am trying to scare you off on it, it doesn't mean it can happen. It doesn't mean you can't make money. I'm not saying you can't do it. I'm just saying you really need to consider the risks prior to making that purchase. Make sure you are certain that you know what you're getting yourself into. Don't just jump into it expecting to make money right away because it's possible you could for sure. Make sure you spend the time, understand what you're getting yourself into, understand the risks, and then make that decision to go ahead and make that purchase. If you guys have any questions, comments, concerns, anything that is on your mind, that's what the comments are for. Let me know down there, hit me up. I will get back to you guys and we can discuss all things tickets, especially season seats. If you guys enjoyed this video, definitely let me know by hitting the like button down below. Also, make sure to subscribe. Have an already great new content every single week in. See you guys next time.