Greek broadcaster ERT has issued a statement on its Eurovision Song Contest website confirming that the ticket sales for this year's contest have recommenced today, Wednesday 1st March, from 10:00 Greek time (9:00 CET).
ERT reported 3.5 million hits from all around the world when the initial sale of tickets began this Monday, 27th February. This resulted in a total overload of the system, and thousands of fans were left disappointed and without tickets after hours of trying. Despite this, 1400 tickets were sold before the site was taken offline until the situation could be remedied. 1000 of these were sold via the Ticketstream website directly, and the rest through Eleftheroudakis bookstores and ACS Courier in Greece.
Ticketstream claimed responsibility for the problems, according to ERT, and extend their apologies to those fans who tried to buy tickets unsuccessfully. The whole infrastructure of the company has now been focussed on the sale of Eurovision tickets, and it is hoped that the second launch tomorrow morning will be a successful one.
It was pointed out that events of an international scale have caused similar problems in the past, notably the football World Cup in Korea. The exact extent of the demand for Eurovision Song Contest tickets was not expected, although the figure of 3.5 million hits should be encouraging to fans seeking confirmation of the contest's popularity.
This time, the totality of tickets for the final were available online, due to the high demand, as well as tickets for the qualifier round and rehearsals for both events. The booking system was changed, with a single-page request form replacing the original step-by-step approach.
Record sell-out
Ticketstream report that tickets for the final sold out within the the first quarter of an hour of sales this morning. They posted this message on their website:
Dear clients
Sorry and congratulations!
Congratulations to those of you who managed to buy tickets for finals today in the morning!
All tickets for finals were sold out without any hurtles in a record time, in around 10 -15 minutes from the beginning of sales�
The lucky ones with tickets will receive an e-mail, confirming the exact seats, link for printing e-tickets and instructions for exchange of those into souvenir tickets at the venue.
Our reservation department will communicate to everybody until all bookings will be processed and finalized.
Sorry to those, who did not have luck today and did not get a ticket…
The distribution site is accessible from the official Eurovision Song Contest website (www.eurovision.tv) and ERT (www.ert.gr/eurovision). You can access it directly at www.tshellas.gr.
