Louis CK is quickly becoming known for his streamlined sales philosophy as much as his particular brand of foul-mouthed dad
Comedian Louis C.K. performs for servicemembers at the Zone 6 Morale, Welfare and Recreation Stage... [+]
humor. He’s repeatedly proving that with the right set of tools at your disposal, you can bypass whatever intermediaries you want and sell right to the fans. Pearl Jam went up against Ticketmaster in the early 90s and lost, but CK is breezing right on by.
First, CK sold his standup special “Live at The Beacon” for $5 through his website, sidestepping cable producers to make $1 million in about 12 days. Now, he’s applied a similar principle to his live show, with even more impressive results – according to the AP, he’s sold 100,000 tickets for $4.5 million in just 45 hours.
Ticket sales are a wonderful example of some of the least efficient internet marketing there is. Centralized sales and ubiquitous resellers use the web to drive prices upwards in a mess of fees and artificial demand -- it’s a middleman’s game. Ticketmaster’s fees may have seemed unreasonable even before the internet made their business simpler than ever – now it's just minting money. Enter Louis CK.
“I don’t do this for money,” he tells Entertainment Weekly. “To me, it’s the number of tickets I sell that’s satisfying. I like knowing we sold out Chicago in an hour. That’s a good feeling. This year I’m going to have the lowest tickets on the road. I’m going to be the cheapest comedian ever!”
Comedians like Jim Gaffigan and fellow Parks and Rec actor Azis Ansari has already gotten on Louis CK’s bandwagon by selling their own $5 downloadable specials as well. It’s progress, but the real test of direct-to-consumer sales is never how well known quantities are able to capitalize on their celebrity. I’d like to see CK or someone like him start selling tickets on behalf of lesser known comedians – if this model can be used to support up and comers as well, then the game starts to change.
