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Chobble Tickets vs Dandelion

Dandelion is a ticketing and community platform provided by Symbiota, which describes itself as a not-for-profit worker co-operative. Dandelion does not charge an annual subscription or a mandatory fee on tickets sold through the platform. It also provides a public event marketplace.

White label & flat fee Dandelion alternative

Chobble Tickets is white label by default. Events carry the organiser's branding and email provider, with no marketplace around them. New sites get a yourname.tix.chobble.net address, and organisers can point their own domain at it instead.

Both platforms publish their source code and both are run by organisations that cannot pay out profits to shareholders. Dandelion uses the Functional Source License, which restricts competing services for two years before the code becomes Apache 2.0. Chobble Tickets uses AGPL-3.0-only, with no such restriction.

Funding differs too. Dandelion asks organisers for a voluntary contribution of around 1% of ticket sales and asks buyers for a donation at checkout. Chobble Tickets charges a fixed £50/year or £5/month, or £25/year for charities, community groups, artists and musicians on the annual plan.

Dandelion also runs a public marketplace, where booking records feed shared attendee profiles and event recommendations. Chobble Tickets has no marketplace and does not build profiles across organisers.

Pricing comparison

Dandelion has no annual subscription or mandatory ticket fee. Ticket payments normally go straight to the organiser's payment account, and the payment provider charges its normal processing fee.

Dandelion funds the service through voluntary contributions:

  • Organisers are normally asked for 1% of completed ticket sales
  • Buyers are asked for a donation at checkout. Who receives it depends on the organisation's payment setup and contribution status
  • Dandelion asks for £25 when an event sends buyers elsewhere or has no Dandelion ticket types. A no-ticket event only stays in public browsing while its organisation meets Dandelion's contribution rules
  • Organisers can pay to boost an event in public listings

The calculator counts only UK Stripe processing for Dandelion. It leaves out contributions, buyer donations, and boosts. Its fixed processing cost assumes one paid ticket per transaction, as explained below the calculator.

Chobble Tickets costs £50/year or £5/month. Charities, community groups, artists, and musicians pay £25/year on the annual plan. It has no per-ticket platform fee. At the standard annual rate, Dandelion costs £50 less each year if the organiser makes no contribution and both platforms use the same Stripe rate. The difference is £25 against Chobble Tickets' discounted annual rate.

Interactive cost calculator

Drag the sliders to see how costs compare at different volumes:

Total takings £2,000.00
Chobble Tickets Dandelion
Annual fee £50.00 £0.00
Platform fees £0.00 £0.00
Payment processing £0.00 £0.00
Total cost per year £0.00 £0.00
Cost per ticket £0.00 £0.00

"Your share" assumes the organiser pays the fees out of the ticket price. Where a platform lets the organiser add its fees on top, the buyer pays them and the organiser keeps more than the figure shown. These figures exclude VAT and cover paid tickets. Several platforms charge nothing for free tickets, and the notes below record that where it is published.

Dandelion has no annual subscription or mandatory fee on tickets sold through Dandelion. This calculation includes UK Stripe processing (1.5% + 20p) and assumes one ticket per payment transaction. It excludes Dandelion's normally requested 1% organiser contribution, optional buyer donations, promotion contributions, and event boosts. Chobble Tickets: £50/year or £5/month flat + Stripe processing (1.5% + 20p), using the same one-ticket-per-transaction assumption. Sources: dandelion.events/docs/events and current source code (22 July 2026).

Feature comparison

Both platforms offer

  • Free, fixed-price, and pay-what-you-want tickets
  • Several ticket prices or tiers with capacity limits
  • Stripe payments paid to the organiser's account
  • Mobile QR code check-in
  • Booking confirmation emails
  • Discount codes and custom questions
  • Ticket forms that can be embedded on another website
  • Sales, attendance, and CSV reports
  • Organiser-issued refunds
  • Bulk email to event attendees with a preview before sending

Dandelion has features Chobble Tickets does not

  • Public event marketplace - visitors can search by date, keyword, location, tag, or map. Signed-in users also receive event and people recommendations
  • Waitlists, transfers, and resales - Dandelion emails waitlists when tickets return. Attendees can transfer tickets or use its experimental resale feature. Automatic resale refunds are limited to supported Stripe and GoCardless payments
  • Community tools - organisations can have followers, facilitators, local groups, and activities. Events can require an accepted application, and organisations can accept event submissions for review
  • Campaigns, reminders, and feedback - organisers can email followers and waitlists, schedule event reminders, track booking links, and collect post-event feedback. Dandelion includes one organisation email per month for up to 1,000 subscribers. Further or larger sends require the organiser's own Mailgun account
  • Co-created gatherings - members can build timetables, join shifts, organise teams, track shared items, and view a shared budget. Choose & Pay covers contribution levels, accommodation, transport, food, extras, and part payments
  • More payment options - Dandelion supports GoCardless Instant Bank Pay, Open Collective, and some crypto payments alongside Stripe. It can also set currencies and Stripe tax rates per event, and offers Stripe revenue sharing by request
  • Recordings and on-demand events - Dandelion has separate workflows for selling access to a past recording or content with no fixed date
  • Organisation growth tools - affiliate links can give attendees credit towards future tickets. Organisations can also import events from supported calendars while bookings stay on the original platform

Chobble Tickets has different booking and operations tools

  • Deposits and balance payments - take a deposit or reserve a place for £0, then send the customer a link to pay the balance. Cash and bank transfers can be recorded against the same balance
  • Daily and multi-day bookings - buyers can pick a date or book several consecutive days. Capacity is checked for every day, with booking windows and holiday closures
  • Packages and required choices - sell several listings as one package, or require a choice such as a room, meal, camping pitch, or materials kit
  • Delivery and servicing tools - assign drop-offs and collections to a driver or crew, with a phone run sheet. Servicing holds block capacity for cleaning, repairs, or internal use without creating a customer booking
  • Double-entry ledger - event income, attendee balances, refunds, offline payments, and event costs appear in one ledger, with a statement for each event and attendee
  • Existing-site cart - one script can turn links on the organiser's website into add-to-cart buttons, then pass the order to the hosted checkout
  • Content-only editor accounts - editors can manage listings and site content without access to attendee details. Delivery staff can be limited to their assigned run sheet

Chobble Tickets also has these platform features

  • Encrypted attendee details - names, contact details, ticket links, payment references, and written answers are encrypted. A copied database cannot reveal these fields on its own
  • Custom domains - managed hosting can use the organiser's own domain. Dandelion documents embeds but not custom domains for its hosted service
  • Public-facing website and CMS a homepage, content pages, news posts, and a contact form with spam protection, edited from the admin panel in Markdown with custom CSS. Dandelion events live on its marketplace rather than a standalone site
  • Apple and Google Wallet passes - an attendee can save a Chobble ticket in either phone wallet
  • Email provider and templates - use Resend, Postmark, SendGrid, or Mailgun, with editable HTML and plain-text confirmation templates
  • Write-capable administration API - API keys can create and change listings, groups, and holiday closures. Dandelion's documented Zapier and public AI-assistant tools can only read data
  • Square and SumUp payments - these are available as alternatives to Stripe
  • RSS feeds - organisers can publish event updates to feed readers. Both platforms also provide calendar feeds
  • Attendee retention controls - owners can delete attendee records left behind when a listing is removed, set how long those records are kept, and remove a person's contact history

Data and attendee relationships

Dandelion creates platform accounts and can hold profiles, bookings, applications, messages, and answers to event questions. It uses past event bookings and shared gatherings to recommend events and people. Organisers can also add analytics or a Meta/Facebook Pixel, subject to the visitor's cookie choice.

Chobble Tickets does not run a marketplace or create platform-level attendee profiles. It encrypts names, contact details, ticket links, payment references, and written answers.

Booking dates, quantities, and totals remain readable so the software can manage capacity and reports. Chobble does not use booking records to recommend other events.

Organisers can choose whether to enable a recovery account when their host provides one. Its login details go to the host's configured recovery address and can unlock attendee details, so they must be kept securely.

Source code and self-hosting

Dandelion publishes its source code under the Functional Source License. Organisations can inspect it, change it, and run it for internal use.

For the first two years after a version is published, it cannot be used to offer a competing commercial service. Apache 2.0 becomes an extra licence after that period.

The Chobble Tickets repository README states that every feature is available under AGPLv3, which has no temporary restriction on competing services. At the verification date, the repository stated this in its README but did not include a separate copy of the full licence text.

When Dandelion might be the better choice

  • You want no annual subscription or mandatory fee on tickets sold through the platform
  • You want people to discover events through a public marketplace, location search, tags, and recommendations
  • You need waitlists, attendee transfers, or ticket resales
  • You run application-based events or participatory gatherings
  • You want followers, campaigns, and feedback in the ticketing platform
  • You need GoCardless, Open Collective, or supported crypto payments
  • You need different currencies for different events or Stripe tax rates
  • You want revenue sharing or affiliate credit
  • You prefer a provider that describes itself as a not-for-profit worker co-operative

When Chobble Tickets might be the better choice

  • You do not need a marketplace and already have a way to reach your audience
  • You do not want the ticketing platform to build shared attendee profiles or use booking records to recommend other events
  • You need deposits, balance collection, or records of offline payments
  • You need bookings that consume capacity across several days
  • You want fixed packages or required choices such as meals, rooms, or equipment
  • You need delivery run sheets, assigned agents, or maintenance holds
  • You want a double-entry ledger covering attendee balances, event costs, refunds, and offline income
  • You need a custom domain, wallet passes, or a choice of email provider
  • You need a write API for listings, groups, and holiday closures
  • You want Square or SumUp payments
  • You prefer the AGPLv3 terms stated in Chobble Tickets' README
  • You want flat managed hosting at £50/year or software with no Chobble charge for self-hosting

Who runs Dandelion?

Dandelion is provided by Symbiota Ltd, company number 09603539. Symbiota describes itself as a not-for-profit worker co-operative. Companies House records it as an active private company limited by guarantee without share capital.

Chobble Tickets is provided by Chobble CIC, company number 17050113. Companies House records it as an active UK Community Interest Company. A CIC has an asset lock that limits how company assets can be transferred and requires them to be used for community benefit.

Sources

The pricing, feature, privacy, licence, and company information on this page was checked on 22 July 2026. Features and policies may change. Check the source pages for current details.