ROCKING THE EVENTS BIZ: Facing down a giant rival, Etix finds niches behind helping fill arenas and concert halls.

• Author: Gentry, Connie

Travis Janovich saw a simple problem in the late '90s: He wanted to see the Dave Matthews Band, Hootie & the Blowfish and other musicians when they played at regional venues, but there was no reliable way to buy a ticket in advance. The best option for fans was to visit the box office ahead of time, or hope the concert wasn't sold out alter trekking to the venue on the day of the event.

One pseudo-option existed--fans could send a fax requesting a ticket, which meant a roll of faxed paper would be waiting on the box office floor each morning. Maybe you got a ticket, maybe you didn't.

"Man, it would be great if you could buy and print your tickets at home," thought Janovich, who received a bachelor's degree in economics at N.C. State University in 1996.

So he started Etix in 2000 when there wasn't much of a ticketing system for smaller venues or those outside big cities. His first idea was to develop a print-at-home delivery method with barcode-based ticketing.

There was a lot of interest in the idea, and it got us in the door with venues, but in 1999/2000, we were super early for being web-based.

More than two decades later, the Morrisville-based company is holding its own against the industry behemoth, Live Nation Entertainment, which sells 500 million tickets a year across 45 nations through Ticketmaster.com and Livenation.com. The Beverly Hills, California-based company controls 70% of the ticketing and live event venues market, CNBC reported this year.

"When we launched, Ticketmaster had all the events and were aggregating them to sell," Janovich says. "But the venues were not getting any of the data from sales, so they didn't know their clientele or who was coming to the venue."

Basically, the only difference in buying tickets online and at a record store was not having to stand in line. Arenas and theaters weren't gathering much information in the process.

I thought it was ludicrous crazy that the only person who knew the ticket buyer was the ticketing company. Our philosophy from the beginning was: your data, your dollar, your brand.

Etix changed the model, creating tools that give venues visibility into purchasing data and options that enhance the experience for ticket buyers. An example is reserved parking ahead of an event.

We were the first company to integrate a true digital marketing company within a ticketing company, with the idea being that when we help the venues sell tickets, we re a better partner. Since we make...