Tickit is an awesome, independent ticket sales platform that we have been working on since summer, 2010.

It started when a design client was hosting a small festival and wanted to sell tickets on the internet. “Nice,” we thought, “how hard could that be?”

Scanning a ticket in the iOS app

So we built a little web page, connected a PayPal account and downloaded a picture of a barcode from Google Images to stick on all the tickets. Perfect!

Since then we have learned a few things…

  • We kept servers humming through traffic spikes and surprise event launches.
  • We bought every single iPod at Walmart when our barcode scanners melted in the summer heat.
  • We made it easy to sell tickets in the dark entrance of an afterhours club or a dusty airfield.
  • We survived a pandemic that shutdown the events sector.
  • We learned that great customer relationships are more important than pretty much anything.

And I learned a lot about business, about code and about life working on Tickit.

On a technical level, we built a lot of things.

Collaborative guest list interface Collaborative guest list interface.

We built mobile apps for iOS and Android. They handle real-time data syncing across busy venues, and are built to work with lousy or non-existent internet connections. We have integrated ticket printing hardware, payment processing hardware, barcode scanning hardware and integrated custom Android scanners from Alibaba.

Tickit checkout page The checkout page seen by millions of people over the years.

We dev-ops’ed our way to resilient servers, well-tested database restorations and infrastructure-as-code. We can deploy many times a day.

Year-over-year sales reports Year-over-year sales reports.

We process payment plans while we sleep, use graphs to assign seats, we scan and block fraud and we abstract away many different payment processors.

Some of the many ticket pricing options Some of the many ticket pricing options.

Business-wise, we also learned a lot. Accounting, contracts, outsourcing, competition, hiring, inventory management, mentoring and strategizing.

The best part has always been the customers, though. The people who create live events are unique, passionate people. They’re often quirky, always creative and they are dedicated to bringing people together. These are our people.

Most of our features and ideas have come from close conversations with customers. Sometimes from long phone calls. Sometimes from weekends in 40°C heat at music festival gates hustling to get everyone admitted.

Our customers have been our biggest advocates and our best teachers. Many have become friends.

Admitting CFB Comox airshow guests with our old scanning gear Admitting CFB Comox airshow guests with our old scanning gear.
iPods and turntables, ready to go iPods and turntables, ready to go.
Backstage Backstage passes aren't a bad a perk of the job.
New Forms Festival check-in at Science World New Forms Festival check-in at Science World.
The calm after the storm at Bass Coast The calm after the storm at Bass Coast.
Swimming break at Kaslo Jazz Festival Swimming break at Kaslo Jazz Festival.