DC-based SimpleTix grows its customer base at home

Aron Kansal has been on quite a ride since he first started developing ticketing software SimpleTix in 2011.
It’s “not the cookie-cutter event website,” he explained. The website design allows companies to tailor the ticketing interface to their website and also sell in bulk for seasonal passes and the like.
SimpleTix, which is run, Kansal said, by “a lean team of five people” from WeWork Chinatown, is attempting to root out its competitors (read: San Francisco-based EventBrite) on the home turf.
The bootstrapped company’s first client was a Canadian company, the Hudson Village Theater. And soon enough, SimpleTix was providing ticketing services for the Liberal Party of Canada. Now, the platform has sold about 750,000 tickets in 35 countries.
But this month, the company powered ticket sales for its first local festival: the yearly D.C. Asian Pacific American film festival, which ended last week. For the event, located just two blocks from its headquarters, SimpleTix inaugurated its ticket-scanning app on Android.
So, what differentiates SimpleTix from other ticketing services? “We offer a catalog of events,” said Kansal. “People can buy tickets for three different shows on three different nights in one single check-out process.”
SimpleTix is also cheaper, he said. SimpleTix charges a flat rate of 79 cents per ticket to member companies, while other ticketing websites usually charge a percentage of the price on top of a flat rate.