Real stories. Real people. Real lessons.
Welcome to The Journey : In Conversation—a special series where we sit down with founders, builders, and big thinkers to explore the highs, lows, pivots, and lightbulb moments that define their entrepreneurial or intrapreneurial journey. These unscripted conversations go beyond surface-level success stories. We dig into motivation, failure, resilience, and execution—so you can absorb lessons by osmosis and apply them to your own journey.
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Prefer watching on YouTube? This podcast episode was also filmed live and published on May 14, 2026.
Episode Description
Join Paul Austin-Menear in conversation with Ciara Azam, founder and CEO of Eventist, as they discuss the challenges of competing in the ticketing industry dominated by monopolies like Ticketmaster. Ciara shares how Eventist started as a solution for dance competitions and evolved into a platform for end-to-end event management, offering flat fees and transparent pricing. Learn about her journey through the University of Waterloo’s Velocity Accelerator, her mission to reduce ticket fees, and how Eventist is empowering smaller festivals and community events. Discover why ethical ticketing and seamless event management matter for organizers and attendees alike.
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Summary of Insights
Niche Focus as a Competitive Advantage: Eventist thrives by targeting underserved markets like dance competitions, small festivals, and municipal events, avoiding direct competition with monopolies like Ticketmaster while still accessing a $1.5 trillion global ticketing market.
Transparent Pricing Drives Trust: Eventist’s flat-fee model (e.g., 85 cents per ticket) eliminates hidden costs, reducing cart abandonment and improving attendee satisfaction by ensuring the price displayed is the price paid.
End-to-End Event Management: Unlike traditional platforms, Eventist integrates ticketing, scheduling, performer contracts, and vendor coordination, creating a seamless experience for organizers and participants.
Ethics Over Short-Term Gains: Ciara Azam prioritizes ethical ticketing—pushing organizers to absorb fees rather than pass them to consumers—even when it conflicts with advice to raise prices for faster revenue growth.
Sales Humility and Accelerator Growth: Admitting “I suck at sales” helped Ciara gain entry to the University of Waterloo’s Velocity Accelerator, where she learned to lead with customer value (time/money savings) over technical details.
Data-Backed Decisions: Eventist is leveraging cart abandonment metrics to demonstrate that absorbing fees increases ticket sales, aligning ethical pricing with business success.
Strategic Use of AI in Development: While tools like vibe coding can accelerate tasks (e.g., unit testing), core infrastructure (schemas, APIs) must be hand-built to ensure scalability and avoid long-term technical debt.
About the Guest
Every event operator knows the stress of juggling half a dozen tools, vendor emails and paper run sheets. Last-minute changes and limited visibility can turn even a well-planned conference into a long day of firefighting. I founded Eventist because the real cost isn’t just ticket fees; it’s the chaos behind the scenes. Our operations first platform brings ticketing, vendor coordination, live maps, scheduling and on-site visibility into one cohesive system. The goal is simple: help serious organisers run professional events without unnecessary stress. In the past year, Eventist has processed more than two million attendees and supported hundreds of conferences and corporate events.
Learn More or Connect with Ciara Azam :
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