Goldstar Events Offers a Full plate of Half-Price Tickets

In the hustle and bustle of New York City, thousands 'queue up' daily in Times Square for their chance to score discounted tickets to their favorite Broadway shows. But over on the left side of the country (and L.A. in particular), often unfairly described as a "theater wasteland," there's a different line forming. Goldstar Events is fast becoming a theater lovers paradise and it's all online. There you'll find half-price seats for live performances as plentiful as traffic on the 405.

Founded in 2002 by three friends with hands in various internet endeavors, Goldstar Events, and its website, goldstarevents.com, has grown to become an innovator in offering discounted tickets to a wide variety of plays, musicals and entertainment events throughout California, Las Vegas and Chicago. I recently spoke to co-founder Jim McCarthy about his 'labor of love' and his place in an ever burgeoning West Coast theater scene.

Michael Lever: Jim, How did the concept for Goldstar Events come about?

Jim McCarthy : Rich Webster, Robert Graff, and I had been working together in different places and in different combinations for a few years before we started this. In 2001, the venture-backed Internet company that we had all helped start in 1999 started to change into something that was just not fun anymore, so one by one, we left. We had always talked about starting something together, and we had always liked the concept of half-price tickets on the net…A few other folks had done similar things during the net boom, but got the concept wrong. We thought we could change it around and get it right. We also thought we could start it with very little money and using only our own labor, so we thought we'd see what happened if we built and launched a site.

 ML: Describe the many wonderful things one would find on goldstarevents.com.

JM: A very broad range. In cities like LA, you could basically spend your life going to all the theatre events we have, though I recommend breaks for food, sleep and taking care of your family. Having said that, we also have hundreds of other things, from comedy clubs, to music, to sports (Go Clippers!), and even (day)spas. Our customers dragged us kicking and screaming into the spa business, but now we sell tons of them and people really enjoy it.

ML: How many subscribers do you currently have and what types of people use your services?

JM: Almost 200,000 in LA, San Francisco, San Diego, Chicago and Las Vegas. Many, many more to come in more and more cities. Goldstar Events has a broad appeal across ages, genders and ethnicity. Who doesn't like entertainment at a great price after all? We were surprised to learn (although we shouldn't have been) that about 2/3rds of our customers are women. We have a lot of great customers who are men, but the women outnumber them by quite a bit.

ML: What kind of requirements are there for someone who wants to put their show up on the site?

JM: Frankly, we have to feel the producer or venue are credible and what our members are going to go see is well done. Mind you, we don't imagine ourselves to be judges of merit or artistic value; we just want to be certain that it's not somebody who decided last week that they wanted to do a play or somebody who put card tables in their garage and called it a comedy club. Also, because the reaction of our members increases or decreases the promotion that an event gets on the site, the things that people find interesting bubble to the top and vice versa.

ML: Ever turned anyone down and , if so, why?

JM: Yes, it was a guy who had just put card tables in his garage and called it a comedy club. Seriously though, we do turn people down for the reasons I mentioned above. If we don't think there's any market for an event or that the event is not going to be done credibly and with some professionalism, we don't list it.

ML: Besides Southern California, where else do you offer events?

JM: San Diego (I know, it's also in Southern California), San Francisco and the Bay Area, Chicago and Las Vegas. Many more big markets are on the way this year…

 ML: What's the average number of shows/events offered in any given week?

JM: Right now, there are about 400 events on the site for sale.

ML: When you offer tickets for free, is it that the event isn't selling well, to "paper the house" or something else?

JM: Usually, it's not that, but rather as a way to build awareness early in a run. When people "paper," I've heard (and others experiences may differ) that turnout is about 20%. The way we do 'comp tickets,' it's closer to 80%. In fact, we've designed a program with smaller venues and producers in mind that uses comp tickets early in the run as a powerful marketing tool. No one should ever paper if you're in a city that we serve, because our program is cheaper (in fact, it's free), more effective and gets you the right kind of people.

ML: Ever offer a show/event that was so bad people have requested their money back?

JM: Occasionally, people want their money back because they hated a show, but it's happened at venues large and small, including some of the most prestigious venues around. We've had people ask for their money back because their team lost at a game they bought from us, but that's rare. Once, very early in our existence, way back in 2002, we did put a show on the site that was truly awful… We refunded everybody, and it helped us develop the standard that we go by.

ML: Favorite show/event offered on the site?

JM: One of the best things we've ever had on the site was a show called "Aga-Boom" which I saw at the Falcon Theatre in Burbank. It's a troupe of Russian clowns, and it's so unconventional and so unexpected and yet everybody loves this show. Plus, it ends in a trash and balloon fight with the audience.

ML: What is the Goldstar Events Philosophy?

JM: Our goal is to help people have a great night out for about the price of a movie. In doing that, we're connecting venues and producers with the best entertainment consumers in the marketplace and making a really nice win-win. We believe that live entertainment, whether high, medium or low brow, does wonders for people and makes their lives better. So we think the more we can put great customers together with great entertainment, the happier everyone will be.

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