A record breaking one million tickets were snapped up yesterday when Take That fever hit the nation as many of you tried to secure tickets to one of their Progress Live 2011 dates. This huge number means that the band have smashed their own previous box office record set in 2008 with The Circus Live Tour.
Massive demand for the tickets this morning caused phone lines and websites across the country to jam as ticket agents struggled to cope with the totally unprecedented number of people trying to buy the hottest tickets in town.
In response to the unfortunate downtime experienced by ticketing giant Ticketmaster yesterday, they made the foliowing statement:
'Due to totally unprecedented demand, all ticket agents across the UK, including Ticketmaster, struggled to cope with the sheer volume of people logging onto websites to buy Take That tickets. Across the day Ticketmaster alone has so far received over 20m page views from visitors arriving on the site, far in excess of that experienced for Michael Jackson last March. The sheer volume of fans also created problems for the UK telephone network.
We had planned for the demand for Take That tickets to potentially exceed anything we’d ever experienced before at Ticketmaster, and believed that we would be able to respond, but we have undoubtedly seen an unparalleled level of demand today and whilst hundreds and thousands of tickets have been sold we know that many of our consumers have experienced frustrating delays in securing their tickets.
We apologise for these problems and acknowledge that this is far from the experience we usually deliver. We can only ask that fans trying to secure tickets keep trying online or through our call centre, as tickets are still available and extra dates have been added since 9am, in response to this incredible demand for next summer’s concerts.'
Thousands of people also camped out overnight outside the stadium box offices to ensure they were amongst the first to get their hands on tickets for the band’s highly anticipated tour next year.
“We are speechless, truly and utterly shocked," said Take That. "This is the most amazing news for all of us. To sell one million tickets in a day is mind-blowing and we think we’ll be in shock for a few days! We want to thank everyone who has bought tickets today and look forward to seeing them next year.”
Promoter Simon Moran commented: "The excitement of the on sale and the demand for the tickets today was at another level to the Circus tour which at the time was itself record-breaking. There literally has never been anything like it in the history of live music in the UK. Selling a million tickets in day is an absolutely amazing achievement."