Hartford Business Journal

20 HARTFORDBUSINESS.COM | MAY 4, 2026 Don Vaccaro, founder and CEO of TicketNetwork, gestures during an event. Vaccaro launched the South Windsor-based company in 2002 and has led it through two decades of market shifts, including its recent designation as an authorized ticket marketplace for Major League Baseball. Contributed Photo Open Field How a South Windsor company scored a major league deal — and what it says about the future of ticketing where resale partnerships are typically negotiated team by team, Lemke said. The shift reflects growing accep- tance among rights holders — including leagues, teams, venues and promoters — that the secondary market is a stable and legitimate distribution channel, he said. "Rights holders are seeing a lot of value in partnering with folks in the secondary," Lemke said. "It's a very well-run segment of this ecosystem, and the rights holders are feeling much more confident partnering with secondary players." Vaccaro, TicketNetwork's CEO, believes other leagues will follow MLB's lead by implementing similar open distribution models rather than funneling all resale activity through an exclusive partner. "The open distribution system that MLB is building will become the industry norm within a few years," Vaccaro said. "I expect all venues, artists and event producers are going to embrace this kind of ubiquitous distribution model." Beyond the MLB deal, Vaccaro said TicketNetwork has recently seen growth in sales, revenue and profit. The company has more than 300 employees, mostly based in Connecticut. Lemke declined to share financial figures. Complicated backdrop The new MLB partnership comes as the ticketing industry faces heightened legal scrutiny. In April, a federal jury in New York found Live Nation Entertainment and its Ticketmaster unit liable on federal and state antitrust claims, siding with the U.S. Department of Justice and a coalition of states that accused the company of maintaining a monopoly in primary ticketing. Connecticut Attorney General William Tong, who joined the case, said the verdict confirms long-standing concerns that the companies "built and maintained a system that shuts out competition and drives up prices." A separate phase of the case will determine potential remedies, including structural changes that could reshape how tickets are distributed. Any loosening of exclusive venue and ticketing agreements could create new openings for secondary marketplaces like TicketNetwork. Live Nation controls several concert venues in Connecticut including the Xfinity Theatre in Hartford, Hartford HealthCare Amphitheater in Bridge- port and Toyota Oakdale Theatre in Wallingford. TicketNetwork Director of Communi- cations Sean Burns said the company is taking a "wait-and-see stance" on the implications of the Live Nation case, noting that any impact on competitors is likely far off. "We're always in support of anything that leads to a more transparent, customer-friendly and competitive marketplace," Burns said. "The find- ings of the jury give us confidence that might be the direction things are heading." Speculative sales Separate from the antitrust case, TicketNetwork has had its own brushes with regulatory scrutiny. In 2019, the By Andrew Larson alarson@hartfordbusiness.com C onnecticut's history is pock- marked with the loss of major- league sports teams. The Hartford Whalers decamped to North Carolina almost three decades ago, and now the Connecticut Sun — the state's WNBA franchise — is set to move to Houston after the 2026 season. But at a South Windsor office campus, a homegrown company has been playing in the big leagues for years. One major league recently made it official. In March, TicketNetwork — the ticket resale platform co-founded in 2002 by Don Vaccaro and Doug Kruse — was designated an Authorized Ticket Marketplace by Major League Baseball, integrating it into the league's digital ticketing system ahead of the 2026 season. The designation allows TicketNet- work to use MLB branding, boosting its visibility in a crowded resale market dominated by larger competitors like StubHub and SeatGeek. It also routes ticket delivery through MLB's Ballpark app, reducing the risk of fulfillment errors that have long been a challenge in secondary sales. "As part of the relationship with MLB, there's a certain ability to use their marks and logos on our sites," said Kevin Lemke, TicketNetwork's senior vice president of strategy and plan- ning. "So it allows us to put more of an MLB foot forward." The new designation reflects a broader shift in how tickets are distributed and sold, as leagues take a more active role in the resale market — emphasizing verified tickets, pricing transparency and greater control over how inventory reaches fans. It also comes as Live Nation Enter- tainment and its Ticketmaster unit face a high-profile antitrust case, intensifying scrutiny over how tickets move from venues to consumers. MLB partnership The MLB certification took roughly a year to secure and required a technical integration with the league's infrastruc- ture, according to Lemke. It's a departure from how secondary market sales worked in the past, when buyers often received forwarded QR codes or emailed PDF tickets with limited ability to verify their authenticity until arriving at the venue. "This is a very fan-friendly program," Lemke said. "Every ticket is verified through this program, so customers will have that trust, knowing they've got a barcode that's been delivered to them in their app." For MLB, the arrangement is a practical solution: with 30 teams each playing 81 home games in stadiums that hold tens of thousands of fans, the league needs partners that can move tickets reliably and at scale. That volume has made baseball more open to broader ticket distribution partnerships than other major leagues. No comparable leaguewide arrange- ment exists with the NFL, NBA or NHL, TICKETMASTER: FEE-BEARING TICKETS & REVENUE YEAR 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025 * = Not reported due to pandemic ** = Not reported as fee-bearing figure in 2023, but as $620M total tickets sold Source: Live Nation SEC filings $1.77B $2.68B $2.9B $2.99B $3.1B TICKETING REVENUE FEE-BEARING TICKETS SOLD (SEC-DEFINED) N/A * 281M N/A ** 331M 346M

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