How one man was able to buy 72 KISS tickets

When Mayor John Rowswell and wife Donna attend the Essar Centre's KISS concert on December 15, they'll use tickets bought at face value from one of the mayor's closest friends - local businessman and political confidant Ted Brooks. While many Saultites report being unable to buy tickets for the marquee event, Brooks, owner of the Sault-based national courier service Eazy Express, managed to secure 72 tickets.

How, you ask?

Partly through privilege - Eazy Express has a luxury suite at the Essar Centre and suite owners get automatic dibs on 16 tickets.

And partly through persistence, hustle and luck - Brooks (shown) and Eazy Express Operations Manager Jo-Anne Brideaux discovered a glitch in the KISS Army presale software that allowed them to buy dozens of additional tickets, four at a time, until all tickets were sold and the presale ended.

"I went online on Monday and became a member of the KISS Army, paid the $75 and on Wednesday participated in the presale event," Brooks tells SooToday.com

"We were allowed to purchase four tickets, however by following the prompts we were allowed to continue purchasing tickets four at a time, until they sold out," he says.

All you had to do was relentlessly refresh the page to get extra tickets with no restrictions on quantity.

Another SooToday.com reader independently reported being able to score an unlimited number of extra tickets through a system glitch.

Then, on Thursday, Brooks added to his stash of the coveted tickets, picking up more through the Eventful.com presale.

"On Thursday, anyone who voted online to bring the KISS concert to the Essar Centre could participate in a presale event, which I did," he says.

So by Thursday night, Brooks had managed to score 72 KISS tickets.

"I did not attempt to purchase any tickets on Saturday when they went on sale to the public," Brooks says.

And what has he done with his $7,000 worth of presale tickets?

"As a friend, Mayor Rowswell and Donna were invited into the suite, and he paid for the tickets," Brooks says.

And the other 70 tickets?

"Although it is really nobody’s business," Brooks tells SooToday.com, "all tickets have been sold at the same price as they were purchased."

As SooToday.com reported yesterday, the mayor has written to his fellow members of City Council, asking them to get their KISS tickets - like everyone else - through regular channels. City councillors are normally allowed purchase options on two tickets reserved for them at each event, but in view of the high demand for KISS, Rowswell has asked that any unused tickets be returned to the pot of unsold reserve tickets to be sold to the general public shortly before the show.

Meanwhile, a search of online resellers by Brideaux and Brooks on Sunday found a total of 872 Essar Centre KISS tickets offered for sale at prices ranging from $156 to $460 as follows:

- 101 tickets on FrontRowTickets.com - 141 tickets on StubHub.com - 100 tickets on TicketLiquidator.com - 133 tickets on Vividseats.com - 98 tickets on EventTicketExpress.com - 100 tickets on TicketTango.com - 101 tickets on TicketsNow.com - 101 tickets in Eseats.com

However, Brooks and Brideaux found the same tickets were often offered by more than one broker.

After screening for duplicate ticket listings, they say they could find only 172 actual tickets available for sale.

Numerous SooToday.com readers have been trying to scalp KISS tickets using SooToday.com's free classified ads.

We do not allow tickets to be sold for more than their face value and some readers have had their posting privileges revoked for disregarding this rule.