American Express golf fans will find tickets for tournament and concerts more affordable in 2023

Slightly buried in the news that pop star Gwen Stefani and country star Darius Rucker will be the headline acts at The American Express PGA Tour event in La Quinta in January is the fact that more people will be able to afford to go to those concerts and to the golf tournament in general in 2023.

The 64th American Express will be played Jan. 19-22 at two courses at PGA West and at La Quinta Country Club. But as the concert acts remain at a high level, thanks in part to sponsor American Express and its connections in the music world, ticket prices are coming down. And the tournament is offering new levels of tickets for fans as well.

Consider that a daily ticket for Thursday’s first round or Sunday’s fourth and final round will be $50 in 2023. That’s a drop from $65 last January.

But on Friday and Saturday, the days of the concerts, an all-inclusive ticket for the day is $79 for golf and the concert after play. That’s a significant drop from the $125 for that same ticket last January, when the concert headliners were Maroon 5 and Brad Paisley.

More: Pop, country, golf: Gwen Stefani, Darius Rucker headline American Express golf concerts in January

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The $125 ticket felt more like two separate tickets, one for golf and one for the concert, even though fans couldn’t separate the two events. The $79 ticket feels more like a bargain for people looking to attend The American Express all day, and perhaps a bargain for those who might only be interested in the concert act after golf concludes. Toss in the 20 percent discount for fans who use an American Express card for their purchase and the bargain is even greater.

It’s important to remember that the purpose of The American Express, from the time the tournament started in 1960 as the Palm Springs Golf Classic, is to raise money for local charities. That is being done this year with the help of American Express and the new foundation that is the charity arm for the event, the Impact Through Golf Foundation. That foundation replaces the Mickelson Foundation that was the charitable arm for the last three years before Mickelson was removed as host of the event because of his decision to jump to the rival LIV tour.

Attracting golf and music fans

To raise money for desert charities – the tournament works hard to remind people all the proceeds from the tournament stay in the Coachella Valley – the tournament sells berths in the pro-am for $29,000 each and it sells tickets for the golf tournament and concerts. So tournament organizers walk a fine line of selling tickets to make money, but not pricing those tickets so high that no one buys them.

The $50 and $79 daily tickets are only part of the ticketing strategy for the event. Organizers know there are golf fans in the desert who will pay more for added amenities. For instance, a Champions Club ticket includes preferred parking and access to a private, climate-controlled venue overlooking the 18th green of the Stadium Course at PGA West. That indoor club includes hosted breakfast and lunch and a full bar all day. It also includes access to all other public venues at the course. That’s $250 for Thursday or Sunday and $399 for the concert days of Friday or Saturday. For $899, you get Champions Club access for the entire week.

The tournament is also adding some mid-range levels of ticketing for the tournament, but daily grounds passes have quietly already been on sale at the tournament's website, theamexgolf.com.

Pat McCabe, executive director of the tournament, says the 156-player pro-am has been sold out for months, demonstrating interest in the tournament and its three-day pro-am format that allows an amateur to play with six different PGA Tour pros.

Over the last several months, there has been talk about what The American Express may have lost with Mickelson and defending champion Hudson Swafford leaping to the LIV tour and not being part of the La Quinta tournament in 2023. But McCabe and others believe the tournament will be just as strong as before, with many of the tour’s best and most recognizable players in the field as has been true over the past five or six years. Those player announcements won’t be made for several weeks at least.

With the new concert headliners and the new ticketing prices and strategies, the 2023 American Express seems like it will look and feel like a tournament on the upswing, just as it has in the last decade.

Larry Bohannan is The Desert Sun golf writer. He can be reached at larry.bohannan@desertsun.com or (760) 778-4633. Follow him on Facebook or on Twitter at @larry_bohannan. Support local journalism. Subscribe to The Desert Sun.

This article originally appeared on Palm Springs Desert Sun: American Express golf: Fans will find tickets more affordable in 2023