Get in the game

IOWA CITY - University of Iowa officials have accepted the fact that fans are going to resell Hawkeye tickets for more than face value, so they've forged a partnership to capitalize and improve on that secondary market.

At the start of this fall's Hawkeye football season, the UI signed a contract with StubHub.com, an online marketplace where anyone can sell or buy tickets at any price. StubHub will replace the UI-operated Ticket Marketplace website, which offered a safe place to peddle and purchase Hawkeye tickets but had strict rules about who could buy and sell and for how much.

According to the StubHub contract, the UI will get $3 for every ticket transaction processed through StubHub related to Hawkeye football, men's and women's basketball, and wrestling.

Although the UI expects to net additional revenue from the partnership, Associate Athletics Director Rick Klatt said money didn't drive the decision.

“It's a good service to provide the buyers and sellers, and it might put the illegitimate scalpers out of business,” Klatt said.

Hawk fan Jake McCall, 19, of Ottumwa, likes that the UI is trying to make things better.

“Last year, I got screwed out of $80 on a Wisconsin game. I bought a student ticket; she told me it wasn't a student ticket,” McCall said.

Using a bar code system, the UI will be able to oversee purchases on StubHub and ensure that real tickets are being bought and sold.

The UI created Ticket Markeplace years ago in an attempt to monitor secondary ticket sales and keep fraudulent passes from entering the market. It allowed only season ticketholders to sell their passes for no more than face value, and only alumni members of the university's I-Club could buy tickets.

The strict rules drove many to less restrictive websites like StubHub, prompting UI officials last fall to consider opening Ticket Marketplace to sales above face value. That would have subjected the school to more tax and paperwork requirements, however, Klatt said.

“There was a whole litany of responsibilities that the institution wasn't willing to accept,” he said. “By forging this partnership, we have been able to make that available for our fans but not be directly involved in that transaction.”

Iowa is joining 20 other NCAA schools or conferences that also have partnered with StubHub. The University of Southern California was the first school to do so in 2004. More recently, the Big Ten's University of Michigan and Purdue University joined forces with StubHub.

“Many schools across the country have realized there's a customer service piece to the secondary ticket market,” Klatt said, “and StubHub has a business model that has proven to be very efficient in terms of delivery and exchange.”

Ticket scalping has evolved “past the days of a guy standing on a street corner with tickets,” Klatt said.

Only a couple of hundred people per season were using Ticket Marketplace, said Mike Osmundson, UI assistant ticket director.

“It hadn't been substantially high because we were capping it at face value,” he said.

Since partnering with StubHub, the UI has drawn revenue for a couple of hundred people per game. “StubHub has been a popular ticket marketplace site for us,” he said.

The UI's contract with StubHub is a three-year deal, although either side could opt out for any reason after the first year.

Joellen Ferrer, StubHub spokeswoman, said her organization views its partnerships with universities largely as marketing deals that allow StubHub to advertise during games and throughout communities.

“We are their official secondary ticketing partner,” Ferrer said. “It's more brand awareness.”

Once a ticket is sold on StubHub, Ferrer said, the buyer pays an extra 10 percent and the seller pays 15 percent of what the ticket went for. Some of that goes to StubHub, some of it goes to the universities.

Each school has negotiated a different revenue deal, Ferrer said. Not all tickets sold on StubHub go for above face value, she added. Half of the 30,000 tickets purchased on any given day go for below the ticket's original selling price, Ferrer said.

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