BUFFALO, N.Y. — Sunday night was supposed to be a chance for Western New Yorkers to see country artist Jimmie Allen.
The show is now canceled and a Facebook post says everyone will be refunded.
"We had a lot of marketing and advertising, but ultimately we weren't happy with the overall result on sales," said Kevin Parkinson, vice president of operations and finance for Be Our Guest, who is contracted to put on the shows.
Parkinson says the concert was competing with too many other events happening this weekend. He wouldn't say how many tickets Be Our Guest still needed to sell.
As for another concert canceled in July that was supposed to feature rapper Nas, that was not on Be Our Guest.
"The other show that was canceled was a third party show," Parkinson said.
In addition to not being able to sell the tickets, inflation is also impacting what was already an expensive venue to host a show at because there's no infrastructure.
"Overall it's probably a 20 to 25 percent increase in cost," Parkinson said.
Added Artie Kwitchoff: "You're essentially setting up a small town in one day, and then you have to take it all down."
The Outer Harbor Concert Series sells general admission tickets for $24 and VIP for $49.
Kwitchoff with the Town Ballroom put on one show over at the Outer Harbor this year and says they had to charge $50 general admission to cover costs.
"Canalside started with a model that was always much lower than what the market would pay," Kwitchoff said. "Be Our Guest wants to maintain the idea of a lower ticket price. The problem is that it makes it that much harder to make the ends meet because then you need to sell more tickets because your costs are still so high. They're really in a tough position."
He says what will help is when a permanent stage currently under construction at the Outer Harbor is complete in 2024.
Still Be Our Guest officials insist cost was not a factor and the last two shows of the summer will not be canceled.
"We've done 70 shows over the last five years. This is the first one we've really canceled that was our show so I'm hopeful there's not more to it than what it is," Parkinson said. "We didn't want to cancel it. It just was in the best interest of us canceling. But the shows we've had at the Outer Harbor have been very successful so far."