Wellington is home to an exciting new business which is aiming to take ticketing in the entertainment industry to a new level. Dash Tickets is a unique ticketing solution. It’s not just about providing event promoters with tickets – it’s about providing them with a cost effective end to end service from set-up, tracking sales, and processing door sales, right through to calculating and paying revenue after the event and customer profiling.
The business is the brainchild of entrepreneurs Christopher Smith and Nicholas Schembri. The pair met at Victoria University where they joined forces to event manage everything from student parties to larger scale functions on a voluntary basis in their spare time. Three years and several issues with ticketing later, they saw the need for a system that addressed the problems, and set about creating one.
Their combined skills were more than equal to the task. Apart from the fact that they both love running events, Christopher is an experienced web developer who worked for Microsoft in the US before coming to Wellington and brings creative flair and social networking skills. Nicholas brings to the table sound business and networking skills. This meant that they were able to do the research and development work for a new ticketing system themselves. They trialled a beta system during Orientation week at Vic Uni last year and are now operating the system for several medium size events in Wellington.
The system has proved a success and, following a suggestion that they look at accessing business support via Grow Wellington’s business incubator Creative HQ, Dash Tickets is now in residence alongside 16 other enterprises with high growth potential.
Nicholas Schembri says that because the start up cost of the business was low, no outside funding was required in the initial stages. However investment funding will be needed if they’re to go national and then global, which is definitely the aim. “The key to building these markets is all about networking with the major promoters and venues who do the big events,” he says.
Achieving exclusive contracts with major venues and promoters is the strategy to growing fast. According to Schembri, the companies that these big promoters are looking to do business with are reputable and can offer a solution that is stable and secure – the attributes Dash is beginning to achieve in the industry. With a Wellington Gold Award nomination under its belt, Dash is proving that it meets these criteria. The advice to interested observers is ‘Watch this space....”.