Taylor Swift wasn’t wrong when she said she was a mastermind. With the AMAZING re-release of 1989 I fell into a deep hole of Taylor’s impact on the economy, and let’s just say this is no joke! Through her Eras Tour, and now association with the NFL she has significantly boosted the U.S. economy. Taylor has been referred to as not only an extremely talented artist, but also an economic force.
- The Afterglow Of Increased Consumer Spending
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I’m sure by now we all know that Taylor Swift’s extravagant Era’s Tour brought in thousands of Swifties from around the world. With these people coming together to take the moment and taste it, they were also spending loads of money for transportation, hotels and the show itself. Fortune actually estimated that just from her U.S. leg of the tour, Swift generated $4.6 BILLION in consumer spending. So what does this mean in the big picture? Long story short, since the U.S. was heading toward a recession after the lack of spending and increase in unemployment caused by the pandemic, we needed a sudden boost in order to avoid extreme damage to the economy. Taylor Swift’s arrival called for a jump in economic activity, so all of this consumer spending in the 19 states she visited not only impacted the local economies, but also the nation as a whole.
- Film Reel On The One Screen In My Town
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Being the boss business woman that she is, Taylor Swift obviously couldn’t just stop with the tour. The release of her Era’s Tour movie which was exclusively shown in movie theaters across the country had brought attention bigger than the whole sky to the movie and entertainment industry. Having this right after the Barbenheimer craze helped maintain a steady inflow of revenues for theaters instead of the predicted sudden drop. AMC theaters estimated $97 MILLION of ticket sales just over the first weekend of the release. When the sales came pouring down it actually broke concert film box-office records! Imagine what this would do for the entertainment industry once the film comes to streaming networks like Hulu or Netflix!
- The Chiefs’ Cheer Captain
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Now that Taylor Swift has a not so invisible string tied to the Chiefs’ Tight-End, she’s bringing great attention to the team from Swifties not only in Kansas, but all around the country. At first my thought was: their marketing teams are too good at this to be true. But once I figured out that this couple wasn’t just a publicity stunt I was in awe of Taylor Swift’s impact; she can really make the whole place shimmer.
Her relationship with Kelce has boosted sales in Chiefs’ tickets, increased NFL’s TV ratings on networks from ESPN to Fox and raised ticket market prices for NFL games (which isn’t particularly attractive to consumers). No amount of corporate marketing could have positively influenced the Chiefs in the way that Swift has. Billboard actually announced that viewing of Sunday night football by girls ages 12 to 17 rose by 53% and the October 1st game had 27 MILLION viewers making it the second most popular game of the 2023 football season. Once again, Taylor Swift not only increased consumer spending but she also generated $122 MILLION of brand value just by dating Travis Kelce.
- Opening Eyes to the Alpha Type of Live Nation Monopoly
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Swifties are looking for something better than revenge when it comes to the Ticketmaster debacle of the Era’s Tour. Live Nation has been suspected to be a monopoly for several years and the Eras Tour definitely led the Department of Justice to a deeper investigation. Taylor Swift relied on Ticketmaster, who recently merged with Live Nation, to handle the ticket sales for her tour. Swift also had a goal of reducing sales in any secondary market to make the whole purchase process a fair game.
As we all know now, Ticketmaster couldn’t take the heat as they failed to sell tickets to the general public after the Verified Fan sale. This inability to control website volume and ticket sales opened the eyes of many people and further research concluded that Live Nation has an outsized grip on the entertainment industry since the gross revenue brought in by TicketMaster by U.S. arenas in 2022 was a whopping 83% compared to AXS at 9%. Taylor Swift’s use of TicketMaster in her ticket sales provided a stepping stone in the path to taking down the monopoly.
Haters gonna hate, but I think we can all agree that Taylor Swift has influenced the economy in a variety of ways that have only contributed to the betterment of the U.S.’s economic health. Even the U.S. Federal Reserve acknowledged her huge impact on the nation’s well-being! So the next time you go to a movie theater, watch a Chiefs’ game or even buy a concert ticket, be sure to thank Taylor Swift!