The Forum Receives Online Abuse

This follows selling out tickets

Last week, The Forum announced that Rag'n'Bone Man was coming to the venue and that tickets would soon be on sale. At the time, it was stated that there would be a small pre-sale for members who have supported The Forum during the pandemic.

When the tickets went on general sale, they sold almost immediately, which prompted some abusive posts online and to the venue's email.

The Forum issued the following statement on their Facebook page:

"Well, despite making it clear how few tickets were going on sale (in initial posts and an extra one today), we still managed to cop some abuse online and in emails for Rag 'N' Bone Man selling out in less than a minute.

Also some quite cute conspiracy theories too. We promise you, we haven't got the time or energy for such things,

Yes - There was a presale. We sold a small number of tickets in advance to The Forum Members Club. These are people that over the last 16 months have supported our venue financially so it could stay open so that you now could come to a venue that still exists. The option to even have someone like Rag N Bone Man play the was able to happen because of the big hearts of our community that supported us and we are beyond delighted to give them a first look at tickets for their generous support of The Forum.

If Elvis rose from the dead next week, wiped away the cheeseburgers, held a press conference and said "You know what folks, the first thing I want to now I have risen from the grave is play a show at The Forum in Tunbridge Wells", our members would get a first look at tickets for that show.

The remaining tickets went online at 8pm and yes ultimately, the people who clicked at the right moment to see an artist that can play to many many thousands were the ones that got the opportunity to buy tickets.

We had thousands of people hit a website link for a fraction of the tickets to supply the demand.

We understand that the vast majority of people understood that there was only a small chance they would get tickets and there was an even smaller amount that decided the best thing to do was bark at a small number of staff at a small venue that are now setting up to open our doors on July 19th (hooray).

There was no conspiracies.

If you managed to get a ticket - see you at the show.

If you didn't manage to get a ticket. Sorry thats the case but head to the website and see what else is on. Music Venues are back and they need your support, not abuse.

Thanks x

ps - Elvis is not playing The Forum. Just in case that gets confused too."