When Rodrigo Bautista founded Ticketpass, he set out to shake up the ticketing industry by building an ethical company that incorporated his desire for social impact into the mix.
A: When I looked at the ticketing industry, I saw a broken system that needed fixing. There was a monopoly of platforms making huge profits and putting people second. For example, the poor efforts to tackle overpriced ticket resales (known as touting or scalping).
I was born and raised in Mexico City, where I developed a strong moral compass from an early age. My mother raised me mostly on her own and I saw inequality all around me growing up in Mexico City. I saw that more needed to be done in order to help those with fewer opportunities in life. So when I launched Ticketpass in 2017, I set out to do things differently. [Learn how to weave philanthropy into your company’s operations.]
A: Our DNA as an ethical company makes us different. We put people first and we really want to contribute to the planet and help those in need.
We’re on a mission make the ticketing industry more ethical, so we are building a fair and safe ticketing platform with social impact.
We’re looking to give everyone the opportunity to effortlessly help the planet and people in need around the world for free. For that reason, we donate half of our booking fee revenue to impactful global causes.
Ticketpass is free for free events, and we only charge a standard and capped booking fee for paid tickets. We set out to create something better and fairer for attendees and event planners, regardless of whether the event is big or small.
A: Event planners use Ticketpass to create their event online and get to pick a charity project or a cause they resonate with. The choice can also be aligned with their area of work. For instance, an event planner working in the food industry may choose to support a GlobalGiving project that brings school meals to disadvantaged children in a country of their choice.
Then, as with any other ticketing platform, the event planners promote their event link to attendees. When a ticket is sold, Ticketpass collects the booking fee so at the end of the event we donate half to the charity selected by the event planner. If the event planner is hosting an event to support a specific charity or works for a charity, they can select that charity.
We turned to GlobalGiving to develop a user-friendly solution to enable people hosting events to support vetted charities around the world. Although we’re headquartered in the UK, we wanted to help global charities.
I wanted to build a platform that could unleash the sort of generosity that I saw in people like my mom growing up.
I wanted to enable the support that could have prevented my youth football and swimming teammates from ending up in gangs and other challenging life situations.
A: We’re seeing a lot of excitement around our platform. With Ticketpass, the idea was not just to fix a broken industry. We also want to give back to the community and empower everyone—ticket buyers and event planners to easily make a social impact in local communities for free. Giving back 50% of our booking fee revenue is a statement to the world that is really resonating and it should be the global norm. We plan on achieving that by expanding in the UK, followed by Europe, the US, and beyond.
Want more corporate giving insights to support your ethical company? Subscribe to get the best content from the Learn Library once a month.
Featured Photo: Be a hero for vulnerable children in Mexico by Crecemos-Desarrollo Integral de la Juventud Oaxaquena.Find exactly what you're looking for in our Learn Library by searching for specific words or phrases related to the content you need.
