It’s been a tough few years for Burning Man, the annual late-summer bacchanal in the Nevada desert.
After a rain-soaked mud-pocalypse in 2023, ticket sales dried up last year, and the event failed to sell out for the first time since 2011. Then, in the fall, the organization that runs Burning Man riled its community by asking for donations to cover a nearly $20 million budget shortfall. Months later, it rolled out a controversial tiered-pricing ticketing system that critics said lacked transparency.
Now, less than three months before the 2025 festival, would-be Burners trying to buy tickets on the secondary market are accusing the official resale partner of doing them dirty.
Every year, the Burning Man organization encourages people who want to sell tickets to do so through its Secure Ticket Exchange Program (STEP), endorsing it as “the only guaranteed safe way to buy or sell tickets outside of regular sales.” But the program’s resale platform, Tixel, came under fire for erroneously charging buyers an extra 9%.
When STEP opened in mid-May, Tixel’s resale fees included a 9% “Live Entertainment” tax required by the state of Nevada. For tickets originally purchased for $750 with fees, that amounted to nearly $70. However, the original ticket sale also charged the 9%, meaning a buyer was being taxed twice.
After inquiries from The Standard, the Burning Man organization confirmed that Tixel had “accidentally charged” the tax and “is in the process of refunding” it to buyers.
“This issue is resolved and we anticipate STEP will continue to operate smoothly throughout the season,” Burning Man spokesperson Dominique Debucquoy-Dodley said in a statement.
Before news of the refund, buyers and sellers were enraged.
“Something feels fucky here,” one commenter wrote on Reddit, while another speculated that the double fee may be illegal.
Nevada is considering making resale tickets subject to additional entertainment taxes, but that bill is still working its way through the legislature.
The policy was bad for buyers, of course, but sellers also complained that they were passed over because their final price had ratcheted up so high on Tixel.
“This is absurd. This fucks all the people that bought early,” one Burning Man attendee wrote on Reddit. “It also drives people out of the secure marketplace and opens the door wide for scammers.”
“The pricing was just outrageous,” said the moderator of a Facebook group created to exchange Burning Man tickets.
Tixel has not issued a public statement about the fee or any refunds for people who paid it.
Update: This story was amended after Burning Man updated its statement on the issue.