'Somebody's selling me a nickel for a dime'...WGC Bridgestone Tickets

So I decide, after finding out I have opening day free for the WGC Bridgestone at Firestone CC in Akron, OH, that I would go ahead and purchase a ticket for said day. I go to the 'official' site, and find that general admission seats are unavailable at the time I am purchasing tickets, but there is a new feature this year where you can get an upgraded 'reserved' bleacher seat, with access to an exclusive club where you can buy exclusive food and drink, for $95. Well, basically what you are paying for is a seat that, in the past, was not, or never reserved, and a few minutes of air conditioning if it happens to be too hot. I took a pass.

So, for the first time, I decided to check the secondary market and found an offer on StubHub for $29 and change. I took the offer. Yesterday I received the ticket in hand, and happened to see on the ticket, the word 'Complementary'. So whoever decided to sell the ticket made 100% pure profit, and stuck it to the person or group that decided to be generous.

So the moral of the story is, you either get gouged legally by the 'creativity' of the people in charge of selling tickets on behalf of the venue and/or said sponsor, or illegally by the 'little man' who sees charity as an opportunity for free enterprise.

See you at the Bridgestone!!!

Sounds to me like it was the customers of the scalpers that were dumb, not the scalpers.

I do not mind scalpers so long as the tickets are legit.  It is the market in action, correcting pricing inefficiencies.

How much are the tickets normally?

$29 for a WGC event still sounds like a good deal to me.   Plus as you said, the other tickets were sold out so you didn't have another option.

EDIT:

I just went to the PGA site and they have tickets sale for $40 still...  Sounds like you got a great deal as though would probably be over $50 with fees...  Not sure what site you went to.

I paid $96.95 out-the-door for two general admission grounds tickets to Sunday's round - purchased through Ticketmaster.com

I went to StubHub, and yes, I agree, I got a great deal, but not as great a deal as the person who sold me the 'complementary' ticket. That was the point I was trying to make. Had I been said person, not to brag, but you wouldn't have seen it on StubHub.

So the guy sold a 'complimentary' ticket. Maybe something came up and he couldn't make it to the event. No point in letting it go to waste.

Remember a significant chunk of money goes towards local charities so while it may seem like gouging, the price likely factors in a charitable donation.  The person you bought the ticket from was either with an associated sponsor or charity who will likely pocket the money at the charities expense.

well, it just so happens i was the recipient of a 'complimentary' ticket a few years ago from a co-worker who won their ticket through a raffle, they weren't interested in going, and they also weren't interested in receiving any money for it. believe me, they could've just as easily gave it away as sold it.

and i would've gladly paid the $40 had, at the time, the ticket was available. but at the time i purchased the ticket, it wasn't, for some reason or another. generally i'm wary of using the secondary market to buy tickets, though I have used the service to sell tickets that I have paid for. again, this is another example of how the secondary market may have been used in a way it wasn't intended.

the 'gouging' part, in my opinion, is suddenly charging 'reserved' for a ticket that was previously never reserved. i really don't think somebody was thinking, we have to find a way to make more money for charity in factoring in their decision. The reality is, with Tiger and Rory not playing the event this year, I'm sure ticket sales are not where they usually are for the tournament, they had to make it up somehow. And at least in Tiger's case, his availablity for future events is not as certain as it once was.

LOL.

You went to the official website.

Never trust the internet,you will get gouged time and again.