Ticketmaster Issues Apology For GABF Pre-Sale Debacle

On Tuesday, members of the American Homebrewers Association (AHA) and Brewers Association (BA) had the opportunity to purchase Great American Beer Festival tickets before they were released to the general public.

A technical glitch on the Ticketmaster website prevented some members from purchasing tickets and many buyers reported via twitter that the site didn’t ask for a member number when purchased through Ticketmaster’s mobile application.

Ticketmaster issued a formal letter of apology for the inconvenience today (printed below).

The Brewers Association conducted a review and is reporting that only 21 tickets were sold to non-members. Those 21 tickets sold to non-members are cancelled and fully refunded.

“Naturally, we deeply regret the frustration that has been caused by Ticketmaster’s technical issues with the member pre-sale, yet this review does show that nearly all tickets were, in fact, sold to members,” said the BA in press release.

Those 21 tickets for the Saturday Members-Only session will be released for sale to AHA and BA members at 9:00 a.m. Mountain time (11:00 a.m. Eastern; 10:00 a.m. Central; 8:00 a.m. Pacific) on Thursday, August 2. Let the feeding frenzy begin…

Official Ticketmaster Apology Letter:

Members of the American Homebrewers Association and the Brewers Association:

Tuesday’s member pre-sale for tickets to the Great American Beer Festival (GABF) did not unfold as we envisioned. We apologize for any frustration and/or inconvenience this may have caused.

We have worked with the GABF team on a plan that will help rectify this unfortunate situation. Tickets purchased by a non-member will be cancelled and refunded. If we have difficulty in verifying the membership status of a purchaser, we will contact them directly to request their membership number. In addition, we will be re-enfornceing the GABF ticket limit; therefore, any purchaser who bought more than four tickets per evening session (or two per Members-only session), will have his or her order(s) reduced to the ticket limit.

We are working hard to make this right for all of the members of the American Homebrewers Association and the Brewers Association. In addition to the above actions, we want to remind everyone that AHA and BA members and non-members alike are invited to participate in the public on-sale, which begins August 2nd at 10:00am MDT.

Best regards,

Amy Naples
Client Development Director
Ticketmaster