‘The Tortured Poets Department’ will expand Taylor Swift’s reach as a businesswoman

‘The Tortured Poets Department’ will expand Taylor Swift’s reach as a businesswoman

Taylor Swift continues her lucrative legacy with the release of her 11th studio album, “The Tortured Poets Department.”

Swift commands an incredibly dedicated fan base — one that’s helped her break streaming records, crash websites and sell out major stadiums around the world. His latest album is expected to draw the same enthusiasm from fans, once again.

It will be an extension of his legacy not only as a pop superstar, but also as a businessman.

Swift proved just how much economic power she wields in 2023. Tickets for her career-defining “Eras” tour sold out almost immediately, fans splurged while attending her concerts, her tour film broke box office records on its opening weekend, and Swift himself became a millionaire along the way.

Swift achieved incredible feats that would be impressive for any average business leader running a Fortune 500 company. He provides an excellent case study for understanding your customers and giving them what they want.

“He’s a powerhouse, business-wise,” Armen Shaomian, associate professor of sports and entertainment management at the University of South Carolina, told CNN.

Here is Swift’s rapid track record as a businessman.

The commercially successful ‘Eras’ tour
The Eras Tour has been a huge success in 2023 and it will run until the end of the year. StubHub said Swift’s tour “was the biggest” in the ticket company’s two-decade history, surpassing other successful acts in terms of ticket sales.

“Taylor Swift isn’t just performing; he rewrote the playbook, leaving a trail of glitter, economic stimulus and friendship bracelets wherever he went,” the company’s year-end report said.

Swift herself has yet to release official sales figures, but some estimates suggest the tour has already grossed 10 figures. Pollstar estimates that the tour’s first 60 shows grossed more than $1 billion.

An analysis shared exclusively with CNN last year projected that Swift’s show in North America alone could bring in more than $2 billion in revenue, making it her highest-grossing tour ever.

Swift’s gravitational pull is so strong that fans are aggressively bidding up ticket prices on the resale market. SeatGeek previously told CNN the average resale price of “Eras” tickets was $1,607, up 741% from his 2018 “Reputation” tour, where the average resale ticket price was $191. He’s also a generous boss, giving Eras Tour truck drivers a $100,000 bonus during the summer.

The tour itself is like a traveling ball of economic activity, criss-crossing through major American cities as fans descend with burning holes of cash through their wallets.

Hotel rooms in cities hosting Eras shows are filling up fast, retailers say they’re getting a boost from concertgoers looking for clothes to match the tour’s theme, and a Federal Reserve report also noted how the tour boosted hotel revenue in Philadelphia, according to one business in the survey. that. .Swift business acumen
What really highlights Swift’s business acumen is how the singer leverages that burning passion to drive more sales. Electric fans opened their wallets to pick up shirts, sweaters, hats, posters and other types of merchandise that showcased the singer in all his glory.

“The merchandising aspect of the tour is very important because it allows fans to take some of that experience home because it’s about memories,” said Shaomian of the University of South Carolina.

“Fans lined up for hours before the arena opened because the merchandise was located in different areas and they wanted to buy it. Even if only a quarter of them buy something, that’s easily at least a million dollars a night,” he said.

That’s on top of the stuff available online. From guitar picks to nail jewelry, Swift gave her loyal fans another reason to spend more, and they did.

Swift’s business strategy extends beyond the concert stage to the big screen, once again capitalizing on the already heated hype for the singer and her special tour.

The singer-songwriter released a film of last year’s show in mid-October, titled “Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour.” The film grossed a staggering $96 million in its opening weekend in the United States and Canada, according to cinema chain AMC. That made it the highest-grossing concert film domestically for the finaleopening week.

“It took less than 24 hours for the Taylor Swift concert film The Eras Tour to break AMC’s US record for the highest single-day ticket sales in AMC’s 103-year history,” AMC said at the time.

And what business leader doesn’t benefit from good publicity?

In addition to countless other news stories, Swift was named Time magazine’s Person of the Year for 2023, an honor usually reserved for changemakers like Barack Obama, Angela Merkel and Pope Francis.

“It feels like the success of moment of my career, happened at the age of 33,” Swift told Time. “And for the first time in my life, I’m mentally strong enough to take what comes with it.”