AEW’s Unique Approach To Ticket Sales For All Out Paying Off

AEW took a unique approach to how they are selling tickets to All Out weekend in Chicago. Tony Khan’s company only released a limited amount of single-event tickets for the Sunday pay-per-view. The rest were packaged with a ticket to Dynamite on Wednesday and Rampage on Friday.

Many who are planning to travel to the event were upset by this practice. It meant that even if they weren’t arriving in Chicago until Saturday, they would have to purchase seats for Wednesday and Friday’s events. It seemed like the idea could hurt overall sales for the pay-per-view.

Dave Meltzer discussed AEW’s ticketing strategy on the latest Wrestling Observer Radio. Given that NOW Arena is smaller than they usually run for pay-per-views, they’re not worried about selling out on Sunday. The idea was to get as many fans as possible into the same building which is being run for three nights in the span of less than a week.

“They had a really interesting strategy, you know, with the ticket sales. They only put on the presale Thursday, they only put 4,900 tickets available to buy individually for All Out and they sold instantly, and then they put the rest of the building up only as a combo, which means you had to buy three shows… A lot of people did not want to buy three shows. People who are flying in are probably not going to be there for Wednesday and many are not going to be there for Friday.

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So… It’s a weird thing because they are not sold out, but you cannot get a ticket for the one show and the strategy has worked in the sense that Rampage and Dynamite ticket sales are above last year. I believe they, in the first day, they beat last year’s final number. I don’t have that officially, but that’s kind of what I’m hearing, so in a sense, it’s growth, and they are going to sell out the Sunday show, however, they get around to doing so.

But, it is very, you know, it’s an interesting tactic. It’s kind of unusual in a lot of ways. You know, usually, you want to sell out the show. I mean, look, they know that it’s NOW Arena, it’s about 10,000, maybe a little less even with the stage and everything like that that they’re going to put in, so probably a little less than 10,000, which is small for their pay-per-views, especially a signature pay-per-view. “

The gamble looks to have paid off in the end for AEW. It sounds like enough fans weren’t turned off by having to buy tickets for all three nights that they’re on pace to outsell last year’s pre-All Out TV events. There should be no trouble selling out the pay-per-view, so in the end, the strategy worked out.

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Transcription by Ringside News