Tickets to Tom tested the theatre’s ticketing technique.
Three minutes into the first hour of sales, which opened at 10 a.m. Friday, a few hundred people were simultaneously logged in to The Bailey’s website in search of seats for Tom Cochrane on Feb 25.
Except for a few minor bugs, the online service handled the traffic, says the venue’s guest services manager.
“That was definitely our first crack at using the system on a big scale,” Nadine Tremblay told the Trail Times. “It went well. We have small glitches that we are still ironing out- mainly font colours that are messing with how many tickets appear in your cart- (are) deceiving.”
She heard a few reports that people were kicked off the server, which would indicate that it was on overload.
“But our technical department couldn’t see that at their end,” she added.
Tickets sold remarkably fast, by 10:03 there were 200-plus people online buying tickets.
After five days, only limited seats remain in the balcony, sides and back of the auditorium.
Tremblay reminds patrons to register in advance on The Bailey’s website to streamline the process at point of sale.
“And anyone who’s email appears to already exist should reset their password on the home page of thebailey.ca to ensure access,” she said.
Although the online system is rolling out successfully, there are still people who prefer face-to-face at the box office.
So what happens if choice tickets are sold while they are waiting in queue?
“Yes people got to the front of the line and were surprised to see so much had sold,” she explained. “We cannot predict which method of buying is going to work best. Every show will be different, I imagine, but for those who don’t want to take any chances, my advice is to get in line with your device and try both in person and online simultaneously until you have tickets in your hand.”
She said this is the policy used at the Capital theatre in Nelson as well as in Cranbrook at the Key City, where everything goes on sale at the same time.
“We do our best to get through the line up as fast as we can and appreciate the public’s patience,” she added. “Perhaps in future we will offer advanced sales to our members but we don’t at this time.”
It’s been 25 years since the release of Tom Cochrane’s landmark album, Mad Mad World, and almost a decade since the Canadian rocker has performed in Trail.
Mad Mad World remains among the top-selling albums in Canadian music history, achieving rare Diamond-certified status on the strengths of such hit singles as the title track, No Regrets, Washed Away, Sinking Like a Sunset, and of course, Life is a Highway, which reigned at number one for six weeks in Canada, reached number 6 on the Billboard Hot 100, and went on to become recognized the world over.