The Trouble with Taylor Swift Tickets

Grace Sommers, Editor

Recently, a new, extremely popular tour was announced: Taylor Swift will be touring the United States starting March 18, 2023. Students and staff alike have been trying – and struggling, to buy tickets for the tour.

“I was trying to buy tickets because my wife has always wanted to go, and I heard it was a good show,” said Mr. Miletich. Despite his becoming a verified fan by submitting his email, he was unable to buy tickets.

According to CNN, Miletich was one of the 3.5 million people to sign up to access the presale for Taylor Swift tickets.

For the chance to buy tickets, fans had to sign up with their email for the chance to access a presale, which then led fans to another queue of people competing for tickets. At the moment, tickets are being resold for as much as $21,600.

When asking a couple of students and staff how much they would pay for tickets, the offers vary. Mrs. Gourde said that she would pay only $150, while one student said he would pay $5,000.

On Thursday, November 17, Ticketmaster announced that Taylor Swift Eras tours’ public sale will be canceled. Although not many students not involved in the presale wanted to buy tickets, the lack of availability of tickets is frustrating to some.

“I think it’s really dumb because there’s a whole lot of people who want tickets and didn’t get into the sale,” said sophomore Ziggy Smith.

“[I feel] not great [about it]. If my friend hadn’t gotten extra tickets, we wouldn’t have been able to go at all,” said senior Alli Hubbard.

Despite the struggle to buy tickets, some students were able to obtain them for their families or themselves. “My older sister did…she was able to snag two tickets for my mom and dad, somewhere around $500 for both tickets,” said senior Siren Perger.

Hubbard was able to get tickets to Nashville after a lot of patience. Originally, she wanted to go to the Philadelphia show to go with her sister and see Phoebe Bridgers, but when the time to get access to the presale came, she did not get a code.

“I’ve signed up for codes before from Ticketmaster before and we never not got a code, we didn’t know not getting a code was an option,” said Hubbard.

Despite not being able to get tickets to her ideal show, she was still able to obtain tickets to the Nashville show through a friend. But being able to see the show, the weekend is not ideal. “I have to miss my AP exam [to go see it],” she said.

Along with Hubbard, other “Swifties” had trouble buying tickets. Junior Greta Brown and her sister tried to buy tickets through the first presale but were unable to. The day after the initial presale, a presale sponsored by Capital One was opening.

“My sister opened up a credit card,” said Brown. Both Brown and her sister used the newly opened credit card code to gain access to the second presale, but although the queue was quicker, it was just as chaotic. “I get on there and it either crashes for her or I go on and everything’s gone.”

Despite Brown’s attempts to get tickets in other West Coast areas, they were all taken. “Now I’m gonna have to pay for resale, which is insane,” said Brown.