UNBIEBERBLE: Irish fans of Justin Bieber, the Canadian teenage pop star, paid up to 39% more for concert tickets than other “true Biebers” around the world.
According to official ticketing websites surveyed last week, Dublin was the most expensive out of 10 venues where Bieber will perform as part of his world tour.
The 17-year-old singer, whose talent was first spotted by music executives in a video on YouTube, staged two sold-out shows in the O2 last week. Irish fans paid a minimum of €59.80 to see their teen idol, although elsewhere tickets are much cheaper.
In Berlin next month, it will only cost fans €36.60 to attend – €23.20 or 39% less than Irish prices.
The second-cheapest tickets are in Nottingham for a performance on March 24. They cost €37.61 including the booking fee.
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In London’s O2 tomorrow night, the cheapest tickets were going for €39.28, or some €20 less than in Dublin, while in Madrid on April 5, Spanish fans of the pop star will be able to see him him sing Baby and Somebody to Love for €45.50.
Shows in Manchester and last night’s in Newcastle were priced at €40 (£34.45) — 33% less than the prices for the Dublin concerts, which were organised by Aiken Promotions.
The closest price to Ireland is in Sydney, Australia, where next month Bieber followers can pay €50.90 (AU$69.95) for the cheapest available ticket.
Michael Kilcoyne of the Consumers’ Association of Ireland claimed the Irish prices were “taking advantage” of the legions of Bieber fans desperate to attend his concerts.
“There doesn’t appear to be any other justification,” he said. Kilcoyne believed ticket prices were decided on the basis of whatever the market can bear and in this instance were “extremely unfair”.
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“This is at a time when many people can’t make ends meet. Prices haven’t dropped in accordance with the drop in the standard of living,” he said. “The only logic behind the prices is that the promoter seems to be trying to get as much as they can out of it. It’s time they were obliged to publish the margins on the ticket prices.”
Sheila Mooney, from Newtownmountkennedy in Co Wicklow, whose 12-year-old daughter Amy was at the O2 on Tuesday night, believed the prices were unfair.
“Everything seems to be more expensive in Ireland because they know we’ll have to pay it,” she said. “It’s unfair because the children are crazy about him and whoever sets the prices must know that.”
Peter Aiken, of Aiken Promotions, defended the prices and said Irish fans were not being taken advantage of. “Justin Bieber’s people do not say ‘let the Irish promoter make more than anybody else’. There is a going rate to get him to Ireland. He has a fixed price and that’s what I have to charge to pay him,” he said. “It was better to have him here than not have him here.”
Aiken pointed out that costs in Ireland for promoters are more expensive than in other countries. Insurance, venue rental, advertising and staff costs led to higher ticket prices. “Everything is more expensive here than everywhere else,” Aiken said.
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As the O2 in Dublin is smaller than other arenas being used by Bieber around Europe, Aiken said he had to run two concerts, and that can also increase ticket prices.
“Say you want Justin Bieber to come to Ireland. There is a fixed price that he has to get. So if your venue is 6,000 seats shorter than the venue in Berlin, there is a price that you have to get to,” Aiken said.
“He’s not getting paid more in Dublin than he is in Berlin, I can assure you of that.
“The venue in Berlin is a lot bigger than the venue in Dublin.”
nThe Booker prize winner Hilary Mantel is one of six writers shortlisted for the EFG Private Bank Sunday Times Short Story award.
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The Wolf Hall novelist, whose short story Comma explores responses to disability, is joined by one of last year’s inaugural shortlist nominees, Will Cohu, who is writing a memoir of Yorkshire life.
The other contenders are Roshi Fernando, who spent more than a decade working in law before she turned to full-time writing in 2005; Gerard Woodward, who has previously been shortlisted for the Booker and the TS Eliot prizes; Anthony Doerr, an American prize-winning author who also writes a regular science column for The Boston Globe; and Yiyun Li, who was born in China and now lives in California.