Market Report: Ireland
The collapse of the Tiger Economy, years of austerity, and Covid have all taken their toll on Ireland, but the demand for live music remains strong.
That said, ticket pricing will remain critical for its growth potential in coming years.
Primary ticketing
Ticketmaster is the biggest player, but John O’Neill, CEO of tickets.ie, says his company is the next biggest followed by Eventbrite. On a B2B level, Ticketsolve has been operating in Ireland for 17 years and has over 350 merchants.
Following a long-running inquiry by the Competition & Consumer Protection Commission into “suspected anti- competitive practices,” it was found that Ticketmaster controlled over 90% of the Irish ticketing market between 2012 to 2018. Ticketmaster had to make several concessions around exclusivity to open up the market to more competition.
“With the advent of the anti-competitiveness laws, that frees it up slightly”
“With the advent of the anti-competitiveness laws, that frees it up slightly,” says Paul Fadden, MD of Ticketsolve. “You as a vendor do not have to necessarily be tied to an agent, and you can give 20% of your inventory to a third party to sell on your behalf or use your own ticketing system to disseminate the inventory.”
Distribution of sales
Ticketmaster reports that 80% of ticket sales in Ireland are now digital.
Keith English, MD of Ticketmaster Ireland, says, “We’ve introduced NFC or ‘tap to enter’ for users who store their tickets in their mobile phone wallets. Since its launch in October, this feature has already seen over a million fans breeze through event entrances.”
One concern is that major acts only play the capital, with the rest of the country denied access to them or the opportunity to put on regional shows.
Value of market
Statista valued the market at $144m in 2024, projecting further growth to $153.3m by 2028. While spending remains a concern for Irish customers, the hottest shows are still doing very good business.
That demand at the top end pushing up prices is something some players in the space are warning against as a quick financial win that could cause long-term problems. “In the past [our advice to promoters] was normally, ‘You need to up your prices because we can see that you’ve got really strong demand, and the market can take a little bit more,’” says O’Neill. “But that’s changed. If anything, we’d probably be advising promoters to reduce their prices a little.”
“If anything, we’d probably be advising promoters to reduce their prices a little.”
Fadden says, “There’s pent-up demand. If it’s a quality product, there isn’t a massive resistance to price.”
Secondary ticketing
In 2020, the Irish government fast-tracked legislation to aggressively curb secondary ticketing. There is now a ban on the resale of tickets (entertainment and sports) above face value at designated 1,000+-cap venues. “The legislation seems to have done the trick,” says O’Neill.
International/domestic splits & genres
Ireland has a strong domestic music market and, outside of Dublin, local acts could account for upwards of 80% of bookings. In the capital, however, the bigger venues tend to skew towards international acts. Rock, pop, and dance perform well, while country has enjoyed long-standing support.
English says supporting local acts is something Ticketmaster has been focused on. “We’ve debuted Ticketmaster Local,” he explains. “With an interactive map, a comprehensive directory of local venues, and a strong focus on Irish performers, it’s a handy tool for both fans and artists.”
“With an interactive map, a comprehensive directory of local venues, and a strong focus on Irish performers, it’s a handy tool for both fans and artists.”
Cultural analysis
O’Neill says that no-shows at live events, especially in Dublin, is a worrying new phenomenon. “City centres are just not as vibrant as they were before Covid,” he says.
Taxes & charges
The primary VAT rate is 13.5% but 23% for nightclubs (the headline VAT rate in Ireland).
Country Profile: Ireland
In yet another boom year for big shows, the heavy hitters of Ireland’s promoting business remain the same: Live Nation’s MCD Productions and longstanding rival Aiken Promotions. But the market is not just a heavyweight slugfest, with a variety of nimble challengers on the scene, including festival specialist POD and the DEAG/Kilimanjaro Live-backed Singular Artists.
MCD/Live Nation stages Electric Picnic in Stradbally, County Laois, and the pop and hip-hop-leaning Longitude at Dublin’s Marlay Park. The promoter, which is responsible for Oasis’s reunion shows at Croke Park next August, has also handled a packed schedule of headline blockbusters this summer, including Taylor Swift, Coldplay, and AC/DC Croke Park shows and plenty of arena, theatre, and club concerts.
Meanwhile, Aiken Promotions’ seven Springsteen shows in Dublin, Belfast, Cork, and Kilkenny, across two separate visits in 2023 and 2024, mean that the artist sold around 300,000 tickets in the calendar year – on an island of just over 7m inhabitants.
The promoter also brought Rammstein to the RDS Arena Dublin in June and took a hand in several festivals with POD: In The Meadows, All Together Now, and Forbidden Fruit. Other Aiken shows this year include Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds, John Bishop, and Childish Gambino at the 3Arena, the Live at the Marquee series in Cork, and any number of smaller concerts, including many at Aiken’s own Vicar Street venue.
“Everybody talks about the resurgence of country music, but it has always been popular in Ireland.”
Main man Peter Aiken, who has a well-known history with Garth Brooks, culminating in five long-delayed, sold-out Croke Parks in 2022, believes country will be a stand-out performer in the coming years.
“Everybody talks about the resurgence of country music, but it has always been popular in Ireland,” says Aiken. “There’s some of it that’s a bit ‘Bon Jovi-light’, that’s not ‘real’ country. But we’re going to see over the next couple of years just how big country music is. I think the values of it are what people are looking for right now. This is a political statement on behalf of Aiken Promotions,” he jokes.
Aiken works with POD, the original founder of the Electric Picnic, across its festivals, which have all had a good year in relatively difficult circumstances, the company’s Will Rolfe says.
“I think festivals globally have had challenges, and they’ve also impacted Ireland,” Rolfe told IQ. “You just need to be at the top of your game and produce really good shows. The summer is definitely more geared towards outdoor concerts now than it is outdoor festivals, but there’s still a handful that are really strong, and thankfully, we have three of them.”
“I think festivals globally have had challenges, and they’ve also impacted Ireland.”
Singular Artists, launched out of the pandemic by former Aiken promoters Fin O’Leary, Brian Hand, and Simon Merriman, thrives in the club environment, but it staged its first 3Arena show in 2022 (for Yungblud) and has arena shows with Khruangbin and Fontaines D.C. to close out the year, as well as the summer Wider Than Pictures series (with Deacon Blue, The The, James, James Blunt, and Gossip this year) at the National Museum of Ireland’s Collins Barracks. Bigger things are also in the works.
“The clubs are crucial for our business because they are the grassroots, but as a promoter, you do need to have some outdoors on the cards,” says Merriman. “As a company, the next step is going into the world of festivals, more outdoors, and just continuing to grow.”
Selective Memory is another busy smaller promoter, bringing acts including Michael Head & the Red Elastic Band, Joan As Policewoman, Kelly Lee Owens, Stereo MC’s, and Hugh Cornwell to Dublin this autumn and winter. MPI is a well- established music agent and promoter with a strong domestic focus whose festival portfolio includes the Púca Festival (which runs every Halloween across the towns of Trim and Athboy in Co. Meath) and the Waterford Harvest Festival.
Arena Market: Ireland
Until the late 1990s/early 2000s, Ireland was not exactly a priority stop for acts touring the neighbouring UK. Now, however, the country has two arenas that help draw in more acts keen to extend their tours to include dates there.
3Arena, owned by Live Nation, is the biggest arena in Ireland (it was previously known as the O2 Arena and before that the Point Depot). Cormac Rennick is general manager of 3Arena and estimates that they would get 95% of the acts playing the UK coming to Ireland. “Obviously, there are additional costs in coming to Ireland in terms of shipping,” he says. “But the market is strong enough to support that.”
3Arena has a top capacity of 13,500 but can work in multiple configurations (9,300 seated; a more intimate 5,000-capacity setting; and a mixed set up of 8,000 seated and 1,300 standing).
“Probably the hottest ticket we had last year was The Overlap, they only did one night with us, but they could have done ten.”
Music and comedy bookings make up about 75% of bookings, with podcasts a booming part of the business now. “Probably the hottest ticket we had last year was The Overlap [covering football and sport],” says Rennick. “They only did one night with us, but they could have done ten. Joanne McNally and Vogue Williams did five sell-out nights with us [My Therapist Ghosted Me].”
It is also expanding into musicals and family shows, notably Cirque du Soleil and Mamma Mia! this year, as well as hosting boxing, MMA, and Premier League Darts. The venue is expecting to put on 130 events in 2024, the most it has ever put on in one year.
Rennick calls the Irish live market “extremely healthy” and points to acts like The Killers and Niall Horan each playing three-night runs at 3Arena.
At its lowest point during the post-Tiger economic recession in the early 2010s, the venue was down to 84 shows a year. Despite cost-of-living issues and ticket prices rising, Rennick insists audience demand is still there for good shows.
“Acts are performing at the box office the way you’d be expecting them to perform,” he says. “Not everything sells out, but everything is running at well over 70%.”
“Acts are performing at the box office the way you’d be expecting them to perform, not everything sells out, but everything is running at well over 70%.”
Mark Egan, director of the 4,142-capacity Gleneagle INEC Arena in Killarney (Country Kerry, in the southwest of the country) concurs.
“People are buying experiences over commodities now,” he says. “2022 was our strongest year because we had all the Covid shows held over. Last year, we beat 2022 by 24%. And this year, we’re projecting to beat 2023 by 31%. It’s very robust. I think people go out less frequently, but when they do they want to experience something that’s amazing. If you’ve got the right act at the right time in the right place and with the right experience, people are going to go to it.”
While around 80% of the bookings at the Gleneagle INEC Arena are Irish acts, it offers the opportunity for international touring acts to play two arenas in Ireland (alongside 3Arena). It also means fans have the option to travel there to see a favourite act play in a more intimate setting than they would in the capital.
“We’re finding now that they’re coming in; they’re doing Dublin, Belfast, and ourselves [Killarney],” says Egan. “I’d love to have another couple of thousand capacity, but I think we’re just big enough for the large international touring acts to come in.”
“We have the ability to take the risk, promote the show, market the show, and deliver the show”
He adds that certain international acts are now insisting on a Killarney date on their UK and Ireland tours. The venue, which will mark its 25th anniversary next year, books around 75% of its own shows, but it also works with Live Nation and both MCD and Aiken (Ireland’s biggest local promoters).
“We have the ability to take the risk, promote the show, market the show, and deliver the show,” says Egan. The Gleneagle INEC also has a series of smaller venues to ensure it is adaptable, including the Ballroom (1,100), the Club (600), and the Backstage Bar and Green Room (both 200).
Music makes up half of its bookings, with comedy and theatre also strong. It has brought in the stage adaptation of TV sitcom Mrs. Brown’s Boys (the first time it has been outside Dublin), Sister Act, and Legally Blonde. It recently updated 50% of its seating and extended the capacity by 50 seats as well as upgrading its monitor system, and next year it will add LED screens on either side of the stage.
The reason behind the rise in its international bookings is obvious, says Egan. “Acts want to connect with their fans in a more regional scenario.”