Big Issues For Small Venues Discussed At VenuesNow Conference ‘25

Rising tides at the stadium level are slow to lift the small-cap boats at theaters and clubs.

Moderator and Pollstar Editor-in-Chief Andy Gensler kicked off the Booking Theaters & Small Venues panel during the VenuesNow Conference in Las Vegas with a look at data that suggests that small venues are not enjoying the same increase in the third quarter of 2025 as larger facilities.

“We have a Q3 numbers, and it’s a tale of two cities,” said Gensler. “The figures have changed from the mid-year, where it was kind of uneven, but this quarter with the summer touring season the Top 100 everything was up.”

According to the Pollstar data, total revenues were up 2.3% to $5.8 billion total tickets, up to 45 million. But when he looked at the data by venue size, Gensler noted that stadium growth was “through the roof” but not at the club level.

“It’s a real flatline,” he told the audience of venue operators. “It’s really even or a little down.”

Looking at the data by categories, venues with 750-cap or less were down 3.5% from last year and 70% down from 2023; clubs in the 750-1,500-cap range were down 3.9% from 2024 and 9.4% from 2023; slightly better in the 1,500-2.500 range with a 1% drop from 2024 but a 7.2% decrease from 2023. The change from 2024 for venues in the 2,500 to 5,000 cap range was negligible, but the drop from 2023 was 9.2%.

“So, this market is not really coming up roses,” Gensler said turning to the panel. “I guess our billion, certainly million-dollar question is how the F is your business?”

The panelists represented a broad range of venue sizes including Steve Chilton of Psyko Steve Presents and the 325-cap Rebel Lounge in Phoenix, Arizona; Brittany Johnston, the Director of Programming at tvg Hospitality for the 8,000-cap Orion Amphitheater in Huntsville, Alabama; Jeffrey Jordan, the Director of Rentals for he Rady Shell, which can accommodate up to 8,500 GA and 1,800-seat Jacobs Music Center home of the San Diego Symphony Orchestra; Noël Largess Mirhadi, Senior Director of the Theater Alliance for Oak View Group (Pollstar’s parent company), a consortium of 45 theaters in 23 North American markets; and Molly Warren, Live Nation’s head of booking for the Philadelphia market leading a team that promotes more than 2,000 shows a year across eastern Pennsylvania.

In the past year, Chilton’s company did 700 shows at 1,000-cap venues. He describes business as “meh.”

“We’ve got a lot of shows that are okay,” he said. “We got some good sell outs here and there, and a lot of things that are down a little bit. Like we’re not having a lot of real bombs. We’re not having a lot of things that are doing terrible, but we just have a lot of shows that are falling either just short or just breaking even.”

Chilton sees a connection between the uptick at the stadium level and declining tickets and revenue at clubs.

“We’re in a phase where the consumers, the concert goers, are really valuing those A-list events, and that’s what they’re prioritizing,” surmised Chilton. “They’re going to the stadiums and arenas and spending the money. And when you drop that kind of money to go see a huge act it’s really hard to go spend $25 to see an act the next week.

“The line I’ve been saying a lot lately is, I don’t really see my competition as what’s going on down the street tonight. My competition is whatever went on sale last Friday.”

Operating a new amphitheater in an underserved market has been advantageous for The Orion.

“I feel like we’re a little bit of an outlier, because we’re a new market to many, and we’re a new venue,” said Johnston. “So, we opened in ‘22 and I think there’s been a lot of excitement every year bringing these artists to people’s backyards that they weren’t able to have before. So, our sales are still pretty strong. Obviously, there’s a lot of people buying tickets for those stadium shows, and they decided to spend money on that, but I think, all in all, it’s, it’s been pretty consistent.”

“Maybe that’s the lesson, own the market,” quipped Gensler.

In San Diego, Jordan is feeling the impact of festivals including Coachella.

‘This year we had a little bit of slowed down,” he said. “There’s tons of festivals and tons of things that sometimes affect the radius clause that we have to deal with. Sometimes agents will put holds on our venue in the spring and think they are going to piggyback off Coachella, and then if Coachella doesn’t release the artists, then our calendar goes to no.”

Jordan went on to say that in 2024, Coachella “released everything so we had a great April in 2024. This year, we had nothing except James Taylor. He saved our lives.”

The Theater Alliance focuses on one-nighters – music, comedy, non-traditional and family programming rather than Broadway series. They represent a large spectrum of venues from Madison Square Garden, The Beacon, Radio City and Ryman in Nashville, where Mirhadi is based, to traditional fully seated spaces and historic music halls.

“Our collective is sharing with us and our team at OVG that they are down and the stuff that they could rely on – tried and true to pencil out their fiscal year – they’re looking to those maybe every other year,” Mirhadi said. “They’re going to try something new.”

Theater and PAC’s are moving away from scheduling 12 to 18 months in advance and sending out a brochure in favor of being more flexible when it comes to booking.

“I think that we will find equilibrium in that,” added Mirhadi. “But I have found that very interesting, since they’ve always ridden the line between this structured environment and have a unique viewpoint on what’s contemporary, too.”

Warren described her segment of the industry as “stable.”

“The volume is still incredibly high,” she said. “Our show count is pretty stable. Our ticket price is pretty stable to last year. It’s a Pollstar statistic but 70% of live shows happen in the size rooms that we’re talking about. And although we can talk about the big, exciting amphitheater/arena tours and how well they’re doing, I think the barometer, from a macro perspective, starts to be set in the rooms that people don’t focus on as much.”

She said watching what’s happening in the market and calendar management has become increasingly important as artists are booked further out.

“Knowing that someone’s dollar only goes so far,” explained Warren. “Making sure that you’re not putting a pop show in one of these size rooms on the same day that there’s a pop show at the stadium. There’s a lot of different factors at play to stay in the stable and be successful.”

The panel discussed all-in pricing, promoter relationships, declining alcohol consumption, partnerships and music choices as they bet on the future of clubs and theaters in Vegas. For Warren, it’s a numbers game, “I think the smaller the venue, the more shows you have to book to stay afloat,” she said. “When you’re booking 200 shows a year, you’re not really focused on which genre is doing better than most. You’re just trying to get as diverse a count as possible. Having shows that you know are accessible to everyone – or at least some people are interested in – is how you know you’re gonna survive.”