On May 5, 2014, the initial line-up of celebrity guests and changes to this fall’s forthcoming Salt Lake Comic Con were announced at a press conference. Among those changes to structure are the pricing plans, which now include discount ticket priced for college students.
“They’re essentially half-price and all you need is a college ID and you’ll get the discount,” said Bryan Brandenburg, Co-Founder and VP of Marketing at Salt Lake Comic Con. “Dan [Farr] and I were both starving students once, so we said ‘hey, we love these students, they are the emerging geek crowd and they’re trying to make ends-meet,’ so we felt like we could economically support that.”
Tickets went on sale at the same time that the press conference was held, including the new special student pricing which is currently set as $15 for the multi-pass and $30 for the “Gold Pass,” a new ticket type available for those who don’t want to pay for the $200 VIP Pass.
Under the new price structure, the prices will increase as the convention nears—tickets purchased at the event will be double what they are currently. Dan Farr, Salt Lake Comic Con Founder and Show Producer, explained that this early purchase price was meant as a bonus for early supporters of the convention.
The convention dates are set for September 4-6, and guests will include Bruce Campbell, Ernie Hudson, Cary Elwes, Christopher Lloyd, John Barrowman and Sam Witwer. Though they didn’t make any official announcements, Farr also said that they were also in contact with many talented comic book writers and artists.
Different from their FanXperience Convention in April—which was meant to appeal to a broader pop culture—Brandenburg explained that they don’t want people to forget that “the core of Comic Con is comics.”
Photos by Nicola Pritchett//[Above] Darth Vader* greets schoolchildren outside The Leonardo in Salt Lake after the press conference. Good to see children still get excited about “Star Wars.” *Probably not really Darth Vader//[Inset] Producer Dan Farr announces Salt Lake Comic Con with co-founder Bryan Brandenburg and members of the 501st Legion–who, just moments early, had marched the two men in as prisoners.
