Tickets for popular Estonian Drama Theatre shows sold out within minutes

The Estonian Drama Theatre in Tallinn held a ticket sale on Monday, 2 November, for its January and February performances. Tickets for some of the most sought-after shows ran out within minutes, while others remained available until the afternoon.

Tanel Tomson, the theatre's head of communications, said the sale went much as previous ones had: tickets to some popular productions disappeared within minutes, and for others they were on sale until the second half of the day.

Number of tickets sold

As of 1:30 p.m., about 500 tickets had been sold at the theatre's box office and roughly 8,400 through online channels. Most purchases were therefore made over the internet.

New restrictions

Starting Monday, the theatre also introduced limits on ticket purchases. Group orders for popular performances were not accepted, and no more than four tickets could be bought at a time.

Tomson said the changes meant tickets for popular shows were available to more people, and that buyers took the changes with understanding.

Measures against bots

The theatre has also begun taking steps against the purchase of tickets online using bots, meaning automated programs. Tomson said that in earlier cases the theatre had already managed to identify and block bot users as far as it was able, and added that, fortunately, there are not many of them.