Tickets easy to find, but ain’t cheap

Average price for ticket to Super Bowl LVI in Los Angeles was over $10,500 on Monday

The Los Angeles Rams have not won the Super Bowl, either in their current residency or in their first run in town. Now the Rams are in the 2022 Super Bowl, the game is at Sofi Stadium, and Los Angeles fans have a chance to witness history without getting on a plane.

Yes, you can be there. No, tickets are not sold out. And, gulp, this would put a dent in even the thickest of wallets.

The average ticket price on the free market, as of Monday morning: $10,540, according to TicketIQ.

You could spend that amount of money on four nights — Super Bowl weekend and Valentine’s Day on Monday! — on a suite at the Burj Al Arab in Dubai, often called “the most luxurious hotel in the world.” You could spend that amount on a box seat at Dodger Stadium — on the field level, for all 81 games. You could spend that amount on a double-double at In-N-Out every day for the next six years, with money left over for fries.

But this is the hometown team in the hometown Super Bowl, and you still want to go. The NFL, not the Rams, controls the supply of tickets. The NFL takes 25% of tickets for its use, some of which go to league officials, partners and sponsors, and some to On Location Experiences, a luxury ticket provider in which the NFL holds an ownership stake.

That is why the game is not sold out. Those luxury tickets are on sale, all with amenities from “elevated tailgate fare” to “top-shelf open bar and cuisine,” and with prices Monday ranging from $5,737 to sit in the upper deck to $36,125 to sit on the 50-yard line. Buy a package with four seats on the 50, add in the 18% “service fee” for tickets delivered to your phone, and the grand total comes to $166,498.

On Monday morning, StubHub listed four seats on the 50-yard line at $46,681 each. For four seats, the sale price was $234,814.69, including a service fee of $48,081.68 and a “fulfillment fee” of $8.

The On Location option essentially allows the NFL to control ticket inventory, said Jesse Lawrence, founder and chief executive of TicketIQ.

“They effectively are pricing the market,” Lawrence said.

Indeed, the cheapest ticket on the resale market Monday morning was priced at $5,663, according to TicketIQ,

in line with the On Location pricing.

Before the inception of On Location, Lawrence said, fans could hope that brokers would dump tickets priced too highly onto the market on game day. Broker access has been limited by league sales and team restrictions.

The Rams will sell Super Bowl tickets to fans who paid more than $100,000 in Sofi Stadium seat license fees and will hold a lottery for all other season-ticket holders — but, the Rams warn on their website, “Tickets purchased through the Los Angeles Rams are not eligible for resale.”

The bottom line: Over the last four Super Bowls, Lawrence said, the best prices generally are available about a week before the game.

“You don’t want to wait until the last minute,” he said. “That is the worst strategy in the new era of buying tickets.”

The $10,540 average price, if it holds up, would be a Super Bowl record, according to TicketIQ data.

“This is, dollar and clout wise, going to be the biggest ticket in the history of live events,” former Ticketmaster Chief Executive Nathan Hubbard tweeted Sunday night.

Oh, and don’t forget parking. On Monday, the prices for Super Bowl parking passes on Vivid Seats ranged from $103 to $1,319.