Quatchi and Miga, two of the 2010 Winter Olympic mascots, promote the sale of tickets. (CBC)

With over a week to go in the first phase of ticket sales, packages to the 2010 Olympics are selling out, and individual requests are increasing daily.

Around 120 packages that contained tickets to the gold-medal men's hockey game were gone two weeks after they went on sale, said Jean-Paul Modde, president of CoSport, the official hospitality provider for the Vancouver Olympics.

Packages that include tickets to the opening ceremonies are also selling quickly, and sales in general have been brisker than expected, in spite of the economic uncertainty facing the world, Modde said.

"This is not something that somebody wakes up on Friday morning and says, 'Oh, you know what, let's buy an Olympic package today,"' he said Wednesday.

"People have been planning this for a long time, and they know that things are going to turn around."

The packages, ranging in price from $3,800 to $34,500, include other event tickets, accommodation and, in some cases, transportation and meals.

Unlike the sale of individual tickets for the Games, the packages are sold on a first-come, first-serve basis and remain on sale until there are none left.

In addition to the packages, CoSport manages the sale of individual tickets in several countries outside Canada, and Modde said demand remains high, even in the United States.

Demand for individual tickets high

Vancouver Olympic organizers, who manage the sale of individual tickets in Canada, said demand has been higher than expected at this point in the process. The ticketing page of the Olympic website has received 2.4 million hits.

Individual tickets are purchased by filling out request forms that are being accepted until Nov. 7. If demand outstrips the number of tickets available, they'll be allocated by lottery. Once the lottery phase finishes, people who submitted applications will be able to buy leftover tickets.

People in B.C., Alberta and Ontario are requesting more tickets than anyone else, though exact sales figures haven't been released, and more events are expected to go to lottery than organizers previously thought.

Organizers are recommending people look at attending more preliminary competitions for the chance to see great athletes at far cheaper prices than a pro-sport ticket.

Olympic organizers are also selling ticket packages during the first request phase, but those are only ticket bundles and don't include accommodation.

Package offers from brokers who aren't officially connected to the 2010 Games have already popped up on the internet.

One such company offering packages is Roadtrips Inc., a Winnipeg-based outfit currently being sued in the U.S. for failing to deliver tickets to the opening ceremonies of the Beijing Olympics.

Roadtrips has said it has a guaranteed source of tickets for the 2010 Games but declined to disclose the source.

A spokeswoman for the company said they have already sold packages for 2010 but declined to say how many.