With the camera lens so close it was reflected in his signature aviators, Eric Church spoke directly to his fans just minutes before taking the stage for his first of two solo shows at the majestic Red Rocks Amphitheater alerting the thousands watching via Facebook Live as well as the sold-out crowd of his plans to tour in 2017. He revealed that his North American 60+ city run, the aptly titled Holdin’ My Own Tour, will officially launch on January 13th, 2017 at Lincoln, Nebraska’s Pinnacle Bank Arena and include stops in Chicago, Los Angeles, and will conclude with two nights at Nashville’s Bridgestone Arena in May.  For the first time ever, there will be no support act on this tour. Eric Church and the ECB will play two full sets with an intermission in between. In an effort to ensure his core fans get great tickets at face value, Church is revamping the pre-sale and on-sale process to eliminate scalpers from the equation.

“In this era where growing inequality seems to be the norm, we wanted to do everything within our power to put the advantage back in the hands of true fans rather than those that take advantage of the system, and by extension our people,” said John Peets, Church’s manager. “It was important to us to invest time into evaluating and redesigning the ticket buying process and build the technology to level the playing field.”

Church and his team have developed a new fan club pre-sale system that will allow them to remove scalpers from the pre-sale process before it even happens. Church Choir members will pre-register for the fan club pre-sale prior to it starting. Once verified, fan club members will receive buy links via text message when the pre-sale starts. Scalpers that are found to be gaming the system and posing as real fans won’t receive the buy link at all.

Church has secured a larger allotment of fan club tickets than in the past so Church Choir members will have much better success buying tickets in the pre-sale.  The Church Choir pre-sale will be the ONLY pre-sale. There will be no venue, credit card or radio pre-sales.

As on past tours, Church will continue to cancel any and all orders found to be made by scalpers. New for the Holdin’ My Own Tour, Church commissioned a proprietary technology that scrubs ticket purchases using up to 10 different data points and automatically flags orders made by scalpers.  Orders may be cancelled at any time and without warning.  Church cautions fans to stay away from the secondary market because it’s likely that tickets found there will be invalid by the time the show happens.

Finally, delivery of all ticket orders will be delayed until the days leading up to each show.  Church hopes that this will make it impossible for scalpers to complete their transactions.

By doing this – investing time and energy to create a more efficient and balanced model – the Church team is not only communicating directly to the fans the best source for face value tickets, but also building a model that protects consumers and can be adopted by the industry as a whole.

“The way this album came together mandated we release it as a surprise, straight to our fans, as it was important for me to deliver the music the same way the creativity hit me—directly and swiftly. What I didn’t anticipate is that it left me scratching my head a little as this year was supposed to be spent writing.”  Church continues, “What this year’s open schedule did afford us was time to think through the way the fans experience our music live, and it was important to us that we find a way to stick to these same principles when it came to approaching our shows, down to the way they go on sale.”

Pre-sale registrations for his Holdin’ My Own Tour began tonight, Aug. 9, and will run through 11:59 p.m. CT on Tuesday, Aug. 23.

Pre-sale purchase links and unique codes will be sent directly via text message to pre-registered standard and premium fan club members, affording them a three-day window to purchase tickets to the Holdin’ My Own Tour. This fan club pre-sale begins at 11 a.m. CT on Friday, Sept. 9 and ends on Sunday, Sept. 11 at 11:59 p.m. CT.

Church’s announcement comes on the heels of his single, “Record Year,” from his album Mr. Misunderstood, hitting No. 1 August 1st and in the middle of his two-night, sold-out stint at Red Rocks, one of his few 2016 performances.

Church’s 2014-2015’s The Outsiders World Tour topped Billboard‘s Hot Tours consistently after Church set new attendance records in five markets including Chicago’s Allstate Arena on March 20 with 18,626 present. Church also shattered Nashville’s Bridgestone Arena attendance on January 10 with an unprecedented 18,411 fans assembled, surpassingThe Blue Collar Comedy Tour’s record set on Feb. 2006. On April 7, 2015 he also broke the attendance record at Grand Forks, N.D.’s Ralph Engelstad Arena, which was previously set by Sir Elton John’s 2012 show.The Outsiders World Tour saw Church performing to over 800,000 fans in more than 65 cities with nearly 20 stops from September 2014 through September of ‘15 and was named one of Rolling Stone Magazine’s Must-See Tours.

For further details on the ticketing system plus information on VIP packages, “These Boots by Lucchese” and Church’s custom-designed Gibson Hummingbird Dark on tour, stay tuned to www.ericchurch.com.

2017 Holdin’ My Own Tour Dates are as follows:
Friday, January 13: Lincoln, Neb. Pinnacle Bank Arena
Saturday, January 14: Sioux Falls, S.D. Denny Sanford Premier Center
Sunday, January 15: Grand Forks, N.D. Ralph Engelstad Arena
Thursday, January 19: Des Moines, Iowa. Wells Fargo Center
Friday, January 20: Minneapolis, Minn. Target Center
Saturday, January 21: Green Bay, Wis. Resch Center
Wednesday, January 25: Philadelphia, Pa. Wells Fargo Arena
Friday, January 27: Brooklyn, N.Y. Barclays Center
Saturday, January 28: Boston, Mass. TD Garden
Tuesday, January 31: Kansas City Mo. Sprint Center
Thursday, February 2: Tulsa, Okla. BOK Center
Friday, February 3: Dallas, Texas. American Airlines Center
Thursday, February 16: Duluth, Ga. Infinite Energy Center
Friday, February 17:  Birmingham, Ala. Legacy Arena at BJCC
Thursday, February 23: Indianapolis, Ind. Bankers Life Fieldhouse
Friday, February 24: Cleveland, Ohio. Quicken Loans Arena
Saturday, February 25: Auburn Hills, Mich. The Palace at Auburn Hills
Tuesday, February 28: London, ONT Budweiser Gardens
Thursday, March 2: Toronto, ONT Air Canada Centre
Friday, March 3: Ottawa, ONT Canadian Tire Centre
Saturday, March 4: Montreal, QUE Bell Centre
Tuesday, March 7: Winnipeg, MB MTS Centre
Thursday, March 9: Saskatoon, SK SaskTel Centre
Friday, March 10: Edmonton, AB Rexall Place
Saturday, March 11: Calgary, AB Scotiabank Saddledome
Tuesday, March 14: Vancouver, BC Rogers Arena
Thursday, March 16: Portland, Ore. Moda Center
Friday, March 17: Spokane, Wash. Spokane Arena
Saturday, March 18: Tacoma, Wash. Tacoma Dome
Wednesday, March 22: Bozeman, Mont. Brick Breeden Fieldhouse
Friday, March 24: Boise, Idaho. Taco Bell Arena
Saturday, March 25: Salt Lake City, Utah. Vivint Smart Home Arena
Tuesday, March 28: Phoenix, Ariz. Talking Sticks Resort Arena
Thursday, March 30: Sacramento, Calif. Golden 1 Center
Friday, March 31: Los Angeles, Calif. STAPLES Center
Tuesday, April 4: Casper, Wyo. Casper Events Center
Wednesday, April 5: Denver, Colo. Pepsi Center
Friday, April 7: Wichita, Kan. INTRUST Bank Arena
Saturday, April 8: Omaha, Neb. CenturyLink Center Omaha
Wednesday, April 12: Moline, Ill. iWireless Center
Thursday, April 13: Chicago, Ill. Allstate Arena
Friday, April 14: Milwaukee, Wis. BMO Harris Bradley Center
Thursday, April 20: Buffalo, N.Y. First Niagara Center
Friday, April 21: Pittsburgh, Pa. CONSOL Energy Center
Saturday, April 22: Cincinnati, Ohio. US Bank Arena
Thursday, April 27: Uncasville, Conn. Mohegan Sun Arena
Friday, April 28: Uncasville, Conn. Mohegan Sun Arena
Saturday, April 29: Manchester, N.H. Verizon Wireless Arena
Thursday, May 4: Tampa, Fla. Amalie Arena
Friday, May 5: Jacksonville, Fla. Jacksonville Veterans Memorial Arena
Thursday, May 11: Grand Rapids, Mich. Van Andel Arena
Friday, May 12: Peoria, Ill. Peoria Civic Center
Saturday, May 13: St. Louis, Mo. Scottrade Center
Thursday, May 18: Reading, Pa. Santander Arena
Friday, May 19: Washington, D.C. Verizon Center
Saturday, May 20: Greensboro, N.C. Greensboro Coliseum Complex
Friday, May 26: Nashville, Tenn. Bridgestone Arena
Saturday, May 27: Nashville, Tenn. Bridgestone Arena