SOMERVILLE, Mass. —

Since the day they first went on sale, tickets to Taylor Swift’s latest concert tour have been hard to get. In some cases, the struggle continued nearly to the day of the concert after fans who thought they had bought tickets to one of her shows at Gillette Stadium in Foxborough found out their purchases fell through. Anthony Silva said he originally purchased tickets in November through online ticket reseller StubHub for about $1,800 and gave them to his daughter as a Christmas gift. He said the tickets were never delivered, and after he contacted StubHub, Silva said the company informed him that alternative tickets were not available. “This is just not right,” he said. “In my opinion, they should not wait until the day before for the tickets to be sent out by the re-seller.” Silva said he switched to a different ticket re-seller and spent nearly $21,000 on four tickets. (see more)

If you’ve made it to this first sentence, you probably aren’t happy about those hefty fees that various ticketing services tack on for sports and entertainment events. This happens for purchases directly on a venue’s behalf and on the secondary market (resales of tickets already purchased).

How did it come to this and how can fans hoping to attend games and concerts combat these extra prices? Before we answer that, we must delve into the history of ticket sales.

In the days before pre-online ticketing services, teams and venues for concerts and other forms of entertainment handled their own ticketing, using paper tickets. There were “secondary” markets for tickets but they were generally illegal if the transactions were conducted close to the arenas. Nonetheless, ticket holders could take the legal risk of “scalping” them at or close to the event sites, or legitimately sell them off site, in person, or through their pre-social media social networks. (see more)

Going to watch live sports has been increasing in price as years have gone by, but enough is enough for Justin Thomas. The 2017 PGA Championship winner is not happy about what fans will have to pay for drinks and food at this year’s edition of the major.

When Thomas got wind of a report from Golfweek’s Steve DiMeglio, which said it will cost fans $18 for a beer and $16 for a salad at Southern Hills Country Club in Tulsa, Oklahoma, he felt he had to say something. Thomas replied to the tweet with the report expressing his incredulity. “$18(!!!!!!) for a beer… uhhhh what. Gotta treat the fans better than that!” the 29-year-old said.

When one twitter user challenged Thomas as to where he thought the large winner’s prize pot came from, Thomas said humorously: “Tv deals, ticket sales, corporate sponsors, etc. from the looks of it if the concession stands were factored into our purse we would be playing for $15 million.” (see more)