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NashvilleBlues
Would you guys guess that there will be better luck with good locations for lucky dip tickets this tour, considering the pandemic and possible concert hesitancy?

Funny, just posted an answer to this before I saw it, in the tour thread.

For no valid reason, other than a hunch, I think they will be not as fruitful as '19.
In '19 six out of eight sets turned into Pit tix for me, somehow I am not optimistic of that streak continuing..
I think they may be allocated to less desirable this time, but as usual, tough to say.

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MisterDDDD

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NashvilleBlues
Would you guys guess that there will be better luck with good locations for lucky dip tickets this tour, considering the pandemic and possible concert hesitancy?

Funny, just posted an answer to this before I saw it, in the tour thread.

For no valid reason, other than a hunch, I think they will be not as fruitful as '19.
In '19 six out of eight sets turned into Pit tix for me, somehow I am not optimistic of that streak continuing..
I think they may be allocated to less desirable this time, but as usual, tough to say.

Same here. Saw your post immediately after I submitted mine. Haha!

Thanks for your input. First time LD ticket holder here. Fingers crossed!

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NashvilleBlues

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MisterDDDD

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NashvilleBlues
Would you guys guess that there will be better luck with good locations for lucky dip tickets this tour, considering the pandemic and possible concert hesitancy?

Funny, just posted an answer to this before I saw it, in the tour thread.

For no valid reason, other than a hunch, I think they will be not as fruitful as '19.
In '19 six out of eight sets turned into Pit tix for me, somehow I am not optimistic of that streak continuing..
I think they may be allocated to less desirable this time, but as usual, tough to say.

Same here. Saw your post immediately after I submitted mine. Haha!

Thanks for your input. First time LD ticket holder here. Fingers crossed!

First timers get a special go direct to the Pit pass

At least that's how it worked for me (twice).
First was the first year they offered them, (called something else, I forget.. "special $85 tix" or something...

Second time was my first time in England (so technically another "first" ).
They had made an error when they first went onsale, and let people buy individual (single) tickets as opposed to a pair, and my $29 ticket turned into Pit- Keith's side in Manchester

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MisterDDDD

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NashvilleBlues

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MisterDDDD

Quote
NashvilleBlues
Would you guys guess that there will be better luck with good locations for lucky dip tickets this tour, considering the pandemic and possible concert hesitancy?

Funny, just posted an answer to this before I saw it, in the tour thread.

For no valid reason, other than a hunch, I think they will be not as fruitful as '19.
In '19 six out of eight sets turned into Pit tix for me, somehow I am not optimistic of that streak continuing..
I think they may be allocated to less desirable this time, but as usual, tough to say.

Same here. Saw your post immediately after I submitted mine. Haha!

Thanks for your input. First time LD ticket holder here. Fingers crossed!

First timers get a special go direct to the Pit pass

At least that's how it worked for me (twice).
First was the first year they offered them, (called something else, I forget.. "special $85 tix" or something...

Second time was my first time in England (so technically another "first" ).
They had made an error when they first went onsale, and let people buy individual (single) tickets as opposed to a pair, and my $29 ticket turned into Pit- Keith's side in Manchester

Ah, just joined this same conversation over in "tour" thread before I saw this as well.. As I told Mr. D I'm thinking LD holders will be rewarded for the loyal fans they are and go straight to Pit on this tour, lol! That said, I've done LDs 8 times and never got Pit before (in fact often nosebleeds), so maybe that's why I feel this way

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snoopy2

Ah, just joined this same conversation over in "tour" thread before I saw this as well.. As I told Mr. D I'm thinking LD holders will be rewarded for the loyal fans they are and go straight to Pit on this tour, lol! That said, I've done LDs 8 times and never got Pit before (in fact often nosebleeds), so maybe that's why I feel this way

Could very well end up being the case..
Going to shift back into my positive attitude mode, and go with this theory!

As a lot of fans have returned even their LD's, the ones with original LD's (as opposed to an additional batch if they offer them) go directly to Pit .

Perhaps. That would be great.


plexi

You have to remember that even if (some of) the originally bought LD's were returned for a refund, those tickets went back on sale and somebody else bought them. It's not like they disappeared into thin air. It's a zero sum game - a ticket is refunded, it goes back on sale again. We posted the LD links after the postponement last year, and at some point, more than half of the shows had limited LDs reappear. Those were precisely the ones that the original buyers had returned. Nothing more to it. The amount of LDs to a given show remained the same.

Currently there are no LD's left, and I'd be surprised if they suddenly drop more of them. I don't think that's happened very often, maybe some shows in the UK back in 2018 had Lucky Dip drops (as in the Lucky Dip link still active on the Stones' website only a few days before the show.). Can't recall if it was Southampton, Coventry or both.

Can't really see an incentive for them to drop LDs unless the sales for a particular show are really poor. In the end the LDs are just a clever way of filling empty seats.

Some of you may remember roller99's interview from 2019: [www.ilevene.com]

Quote

IL: So, one last question for you. How does the Lucky Dip work? Doesn't it affect box office numbers?




JM: Paul Gongaware came up with that idea. What we do is we take the last couple of rows up in the top of the building, maybe three or four rows, whatever it may be. Those are our really cheap seats. I forget how much we sell lucky dip for, but it's really cheap. We always know we're going to have production kills, things like the need for camera positions, sightlines, all that type of stuff. The fact is when you open up that many production holds, it can be a thousand seats or so when you get your production loaded in. You're not necessarily going to sell those at the last minute because everybody thinks the show is sold out.




So what we do is we take like a hundred seats from the pit, we take these other good seats that end up being from production kills, and we mix them all together, right? And then you put them in envelopes. So when people show up, they get an envelope. Most of them are going to end up in the nosebleeds, right? With the cheap seats. But some of them are going to end up in the pit and some of them are going to end up down there. So what it does, it allows us to make sure the house is completely full. It's a good way to clean up those seats at a cheap price. But it's really cool because a lot of people end up getting great seats. That's all it is. You know, it's nothing more than that. There’s no scam, nothing like that involved. It's just lucky dip. You may get lucky and end up in the pit. You may end up in a row in front of a mixer that we didn't think we could sell. It's really a cool program. I love it.

You're dreaming in Technicolor if you think that the postponement/rescheduling somehow affects your Dip Luck. But sure, you can dream. Can't hurt to think positive, right?

Note that the article does go on saying that every once in a while, "operational upgrades" happen. If you're really lucky, you may get a pit wristband and get comped from, say, from the GA all the way in the back right to the pit. But that's an entirely different thing than outright scoring pit on your LDs.

Also, it's possible to team up with a friend/family member and buy multiple pairs of LDs to improve your chances, but that too is another matter.



Edited 5 time(s). Last edit at 2021-06-24 11:11 by Topi.

as far as I remember relative few people in the US got pit tickets or good seat with LD tickets
(the ratio of people scoring pit was much higher in Europe)

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slewan
as far as I remember relative few people in the US got pit tickets or good seat with LD tickets
(the ratio of people scoring pit was much higher in Europe)

You mean relatively few as in less people reporting they got pit tickets?

There may be some truth to this, but I don't think it's a totally different game in the US compared to Europe.

I mean, if somebody gets nosebleeds/bad seats on their LD's, they're probably less inclined to report their "bad luck" online/on social media. However, if there's "pit luck", people are more than happy to share that, and it may lead to a perception bias. The situation seems better than it really is because you only see the good luck being reported.

At the end of the day there's no real "bad luck" on the LDs because they're still a cheaper ticket than anything at face value. There's no real loss.

Also, there have been exceptions such as Prague, where practically all the LDs were actually just GA tickets at first. I remember standing at the LD counter, arguing - well, "closing a deal" - basically persuading them to give me a pit ticket when at first they were only giving out regular GA. Of course, Prague as a setup was very different from a lot of shows.

(It took an hour, but they did give me pit tickets in the end. Persistence paid off. That had NOTHING to do with "random draw" or luck.)



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 2021-06-24 11:22 by Topi.

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Topi
You have to remember that even if (some of) the originally bought LD's were returned for a refund, those tickets went back on sale and somebody else bought them. It's not like they disappeared into thin air. It's a zero sum game - a ticket is refunded, it goes back on sale again. We posted the LD links after the postponement last year, and at some point, more than half of the shows had limited LDs reappear. Those were precisely the ones that the original buyers had returned. Nothing more to it. The amount of LDs to a given show remained the same.

Currently there are no LD's left, and I'd be surprised if they suddenly drop more of them. I don't think that's happened very often, maybe some shows in the UK back in 2018 had Lucky Dip drops (as in the Lucky Dip link still active on the Stones' website only a few days before the show.). Can't recall if it was Southampton, Coventry or both.

Can't really see an incentive for them to drop LDs unless the sales for a particular show are really poor. In the end the LDs are just a clever way of filling empty seats.

Some of you may remember roller99's interview from 2019: [www.ilevene.com]

Quote

IL: So, one last question for you. How does the Lucky Dip work? Doesn't it affect box office numbers?




JM: Paul Gongaware came up with that idea. What we do is we take the last couple of rows up in the top of the building, maybe three or four rows, whatever it may be. Those are our really cheap seats. I forget how much we sell lucky dip for, but it's really cheap. We always know we're going to have production kills, things like the need for camera positions, sightlines, all that type of stuff. The fact is when you open up that many production holds, it can be a thousand seats or so when you get your production loaded in. You're not necessarily going to sell those at the last minute because everybody thinks the show is sold out.




So what we do is we take like a hundred seats from the pit, we take these other good seats that end up being from production kills, and we mix them all together, right? And then you put them in envelopes. So when people show up, they get an envelope. Most of them are going to end up in the nosebleeds, right? With the cheap seats. But some of them are going to end up in the pit and some of them are going to end up down there. So what it does, it allows us to make sure the house is completely full. It's a good way to clean up those seats at a cheap price. But it's really cool because a lot of people end up getting great seats. That's all it is. You know, it's nothing more than that. There’s no scam, nothing like that involved. It's just lucky dip. You may get lucky and end up in the pit. You may end up in a row in front of a mixer that we didn't think we could sell. It's really a cool program. I love it.

You're dreaming in Technicolor if you think that the postponement/rescheduling somehow affects your Dip Luck. But sure, you can dream. Can't hurt to think positive, right?

Note that the article does go on saying that every once in a while, "operational upgrades" happen. If you're really lucky, you may get a pit wristband and get comped from, say, from the GA all the way in the back right to the pit. But that's an entirely different thing than outright scoring pit on your LDs.

Also, it's possible to team up with a friend/family member and buy multiple pairs of LDs to improve your chances, but that too is another matter.

All true, but-
There have been slow selling shows, both in the US and the UK, where they have released more rounds of Lucky Dips or even Groupons etc to fill the seats.
When that happens, they generally are completely allocated to nosebleeds etc has been my experience (Cardiff '18 being one ).

So, my theory is that if the '21 shows aren't "selling out" for pandemic/vaccine or other reasons, they could release more, and those would be mostly nosebleeds isn't too far fetched.
Also, I returned my Austin Lucky Dips way late after the postponement, probably not many did that, but those weren't offered up again, so that could also play into initiating of a second round.

The last US '19 leg, most of the Lucky Dips that weren't Pit, were side stage second level at most of the shows. Not many "nosebleeds" to be found.
As opposed to the first several years, where it was feast or famine, they seemed to make a real effort to make all LD's pretty good in recent tours imo.

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Topi

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slewan
as far as I remember relative few people in the US got pit tickets or good seat with LD tickets
(the ratio of people scoring pit was much higher in Europe)

You mean relatively few as in less people reporting they got pit tickets?

There may be some truth to this, but I don't think it's a totally different game in the US compared to Europe.

I mean, if somebody gets nosebleeds/bad seats on their LD's, they're probably less inclined to report their "bad luck" online/on social media. However, if there's "pit luck", people are more than happy to share that, and it may lead to a perception bias. The situation seems better than it really is because you only see the good luck being reported.

At the end of the day there's no real "bad luck" on the LDs because they're still a cheaper ticket than anything at face value. There's no real loss.

Also, there have been exceptions such as Prague, where practically all the LDs were actually just GA tickets at first. I remember standing at the LD counter, arguing - well, "closing a deal" - basically persuading them to give me a pit ticket when at first they were only giving out regular GA. Of course, Prague as a setup was very different from a lot of shows.

(It took an hour, but they did give me pit tickets in the end. Persistence paid off. That had NOTHING to do with "random draw" or luck.)

Ha, that's a good story Topi, persistence pays off.

I've had Lucky Dips 3 times now. First for Toronto in 2013. Got nosebleeds behind the stage, BEHIND. Five minutes before show time our entire row was upgraded by an usher to beautiful seats right beside the stage, eye level.

Second, Seattle 2019. Right beside stage. Fantastic.

In both cases fabulous seats, not pit, but still felt like we won a mini-lottery.

Third...Vancouver, 2020, or 2021 or 2022 or maybe never. We'll see how that goes but I'm not overly optimistic given I'm batting 1000 already.

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Topi

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slewan
as far as I remember relative few people in the US got pit tickets or good seat with LD tickets
(the ratio of people scoring pit was much higher in Europe)

You mean relatively few as in less people reporting they got pit tickets?

There may be some truth to this, but I don't think it's a totally different game in the US compared to Europe.

I mean, if somebody gets nosebleeds/bad seats on their LD's, they're probably less inclined to report their "bad luck" online/on social media. However, if there's "pit luck", people are more than happy to share that, and it may lead to a perception bias. The situation seems better than it really is because you only see the good luck being reported.

At the end of the day there's no real "bad luck" on the LDs because they're still a cheaper ticket than anything at face value. There's no real loss.

Also, there have been exceptions such as Prague, where practically all the LDs were actually just GA tickets at first. I remember standing at the LD counter, arguing - well, "closing a deal" - basically persuading them to give me a pit ticket when at first they were only giving out regular GA. Of course, Prague as a setup was very different from a lot of shows.

(It took an hour, but they did give me pit tickets in the end. Persistence paid off. That had NOTHING to do with "random draw" or luck.)

well, reporting may play a part. But I guess people here on IORR tend to report anything.
Well, Prague, like everybody I got GA but for some stupid reasons I can't remember I didn't complain and ask for an upgrade.

In Berlin they were still handing out pit tickets more than 1,5 hours after the counter opened.
There were plenty of pit and gold circle tickets in the LD bowl for the London shows, too.
Pit LD tickets for Düsseldorf seemed to be quite rare…

MisterDDDD: Austin Lucky Dips did reappear, as late as February this year. See my post on psge 19 of this thread.

Of course, the refunded LDs are never "offered", you have to know the direct link.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2021-06-24 15:25 by Topi.

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Topi
MisterDDDD: Austin Lucky Dips did reappear, as late as February this year. See my post on psge 19 of this thread.

Of course, the refunded LDs are never "offered", you have to know the direct link.

Oh, I'm well aware Topi.. not very many knew that info tho,
I suppose they could have thrown them all back in the pool, but I'm doubtful. Either way, a second round is not out of the question considering the situation.

I think Ticketmaster has no choice but to put a refunded ticket back on sale. They, of course, make money on those "convenience fees".

Could be a fully automatic process for all we know, as every ticket has a placeholder in the system.

Austin LD's just appeared if anyone interested. I've Got 2 already from when they 1st went onsale. Along with Atlanta,Charlotte,Tampa and Nashville.

[www.ticketmaster.com]

2019 LD were Chicago 1- pit ronnies side.
DC and same, pit ronnies side
Philly 100 level ronnies side
East Rutherford 2, 200 level Keiths side.

I will be getting refunds for my Nashville and Minnesota Lucky Dips so those links may come in handy at some point

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Topi
I will be getting refunds for my Nashville and Minnesota Lucky Dips so those links may come in handy at some point

Sitting on a pair, but wouldn't mind doubling up
Let us know (or perhaps already requested refund?)

Nope, didn't pull the trigger just yet. Will let you guys know.

Can anyone repost the links?

Looking for one STL LD

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kv2915
Can anyone repost the links?

Look back on this thread.

But the links are not lucky dip links anymore, right? When click the links a couple of pages back in this thread after a queue only the regular sale appears.

That is simply because there are no LD tickets currently available. It's all been explained on the previous pages

The only way LDs for rescheduled shows to appear now is if current LD holders still decide to get refunds on theirs. That's it.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 2021-07-22 20:53 by Topi.

I hope there's an opportunity to get more LD's. I've never done it before and like the idea of it

Well, at least for the three new shows, there should be LDs available on the day of the general onsale.

So when LD tix are thrown back, how do they appear on TM? I assume they don’t have a button for just one or a pair?

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Topi
Well, at least for the three new shows, there should be LDs available on the day of the general onsale.

Any chance they release Lucky Dips as part of the pre-sale? (Like those of us on the mailing list)

No. Dips are only offered at the general sale.