Hockey fans in Boston have "flocked to the secondary ticket market" since the NHL's schedule was release last week, as tickets to see the Bruins have "sold for as much as $639 online -- six times their original cost," according to Callum Borchers of the BOSTON GLOBE. Data from TiqIQ shows that the "average price of a Bruins ticket on the secondary market is $150.13 ... 30 percent higher now, following the lockout, than it was at the start of last season, when the team reigned as the defending Stanley Cup Champion." Even tickets to a Bruins scrimmage on Tuesday night -- which the team "distributed for free Monday on a first-come, first-served basis -- sold online for as much as $59." StubHub PR Coordinator Shannon Barbara said that the Bruins' ticket page "was viewed more than 200,000 times between Saturday night and Monday afternoon." TiqIQ Senior Dir of Data & Communications Chris Matcovich said that during the first two days after the NHL schedule was released, season-ticket holders "flooded the secondary market with 48,000 Bruins tickets." The team begins the season Saturday against the Rangers at TD Garden, and Spotlight TMS CEO & co-Founder Tony Knopp said for season-ticket holders, "now’s the time to sell." Borchers reports the "instant demand for tickets, now that the lockout is over, continues a historical trend." Barbara said that prices "typically go up after a sports league misses games ... because fans have fewer opportunities to see their teams live during shortened seasons." Twenty-five of the 30 teams in the '05-06 season "enjoyed higher attendance than they had in the season before" the locked-out '04-05 campaign (BOSTON GLOBE, 1/18).
UTILIZING THE PRINT OPTION: In Boston, Kevin Paul Dupont reports there will be "no hard tickets" for Bruins games this year. Season-ticket holders "must print their own tickets, and those purchased through the box office or elsewhere likewise will be generated electronically." TD Garden President Amy Latimer said that with the lockout looming, the Bruins "never printed tickets for the 82-game schedule that was released during the summer." She added that tickets for the new 48-game schedule "would have taken upward of six weeks to print and distribute" (BOSTON GLOBE, 1/18).
