Ticketmaster said that its new secondary ticketing partnership with the Yankees to create Yankees Ticket Exchange will be "profitable, despite its slashing of seller commissions" from the 15% industry norm to 5% for season-ticket holders, according to Eric Fisher of SPORTSBUSINESS JOURNAL. Ticketmaster and StubHub have been "fierce competitors for more than a decade, but the arrival of Yankees Ticket Exchange introduces a price war between the two in the key New York market and for one of the most dominant brands in all of pro sports." Ticketmaster CEO Nathan Hubbard said, "The margins of the secondary business at traditional levels have been very healthy at scale, and we expect success here, too” (SPORTSBUSINESS JOURNAL, 2/18 issue). In N.Y., Garett Sloane notes the Yankees’ "move to dump StubHub and bring on Ticketmaster as its official reselling partner won’t necessarily bring cheaper ticket prices." Sloane: "In fact, fans might end up spending more." Prices on "dozens of tickets on StubHub yesterday" were 7.5% lower on average "than comparable prices posted on the Yankees Ticket Exchange." Of 28 cases for four games in the first half of the season, StubHub had a "lower price on comparable tickets in 27 cases." For Opening Day, for example, tickets at "seven different locations in Yankee Stadium" averaged 5.5% lower on StubHub (N.Y. POST, 2/19).
