Posted: 3/6/17 at 5:15pm
You would be surprised how much it costs to rent a Charter Bus in some markets.
On a recent tour we were flown between 2 cities in the same state, which we have always traveled the easy- one day (about 5 hours)- drive on a bus because the cost of flying everyone on an airline like Southwest, booking early and with a group rate, where all checked bags are free, was still significantly cheaper than it would have cost for a Bus.
Much of how the road is booked has to do with the Venue and what they have scheduled in house. For many tour markets, the Broadway Series is only one small part of their yearly season. If they have Opera/Symphony/Philharmonic in house, or if there is a city wide conference that has booked out all of the hotels and convention/performance venues for their conference, it would create a booking issue.
Cases like Boston/Providence/Worcester also exist, where a larger Tour market wouldn't want a smaller market to actively advertise the same product in the same viewing markets (TV and Radio adverts) in the same season.
Years back, when two similarly themed musicals were both touring, I asked a locally based road presenter if they would ever try to book them back-to-back and create an combined event, and I was told that one of the 2 shows had a non-competition clause in their rider, that no other similarly themed product could be booked in the same season, be advertised on the same marketing materials, etc. Which would also create booking logistic issues.
