$2 billion in tickets just for the chance to make like $400m in merch.
I bet resale sites made just as much as taylor did
Good god this is like half a fortune 500 company lol
What is that? A 30% margin? Pretty good. Most retail margins are under 5%
Would have been more interesting to cut it by ticket revenue – costs and merch revenue – costs, then adding those results together to get the net income before taxes.
Merch is doing an outsize fraction of the heavy lifting here compared to its 20% of revenue contribution.
The bonus she gave to the crew was almost 30% of the total income after taxes. That’s….. much more generous than I had expected.
2.5 billion in revenue!?! Jeeeeezus
I updated the image based on your feedback to show tickets vs merch more clearly.
It seems like everyone is making a good deal for what they are providing. Honestly expected worse
No advertising expense etc?
How do they set merch prices, do you suppose? How’s that conversation go…
“Well look, if we sell t-shirts at $25 apiece, we’re going to make $440m by the end of this tour!”
“Yeah… But if we sell t-shirts for $45 apiece, we’ll take home $650m.”
Is the promotor cut Ticketmaster/ live Nation? What a hustle all they do is run the website and process payments and they get that much.
She paid bonuses equal to 10% of revenue. Has there ever been a corporation pay bonuses like that?
Not total comp, bonuses? It appears comp is past of the $415m staging and production
$500M in merch is wild.
The profit margins are MASSIVE. You can get the same shirt from Aliexpress a month later, but people just bake the merch into the experience these days (and thus want authentic to tell the story of the show/waiting in line, etc.)
I go to 50 concerts a year and buy merch maybe once a year for a super rare show or from a band that barely tours.
Who gets the net earnings?
It stills blows my mind that, at all levels, it’s been normalised that venues get a cut of the merch sales. Rarely has a cut been less deserved
Nice leverage of tax law with the bonus structure. Kudos.
When you’re as popular as TS what more value could a promoter bring? The tickets would all be sold out even if it took waiting in line for days for hard tickets like back in the day. Why on earth would TS need a promoter at this level let alone paying such a ridiculous amount for them?
Promoter gets $200M! Promoting a Swift show is the easiest job in the world. Every show sold out as soon as it was announced.
Can someone ELI5 why Taylor Swift needs to spend $200 million on promoters?
That margin on the merch though.
I’m skeptical of those promoter cuts and stadium fees. By leg 2 this tour was a guaranteed sellout, if Taylor had competent lawyers and management (she does) there just isn’t any chance they’re paying the promoter 10% of ticket gross for zero risk.
Similar with venues, there’s just no way she gave up 30% of the gross, she probably kept close to 100%, with the venues all too happy to fill tens of thousands of seats full of beer and concessions buyers and paid parkers for those nights.
As stated plenty and downvoted to smithereens that crew bonus was a nice tax cutting number to the max, exactly 197. Not 195 not 200 but exactly 197.
They have the crew/performer bonus’ but not their actual regular wages. Unless I’m missing something. Oh, maybe that’s part of Staging and Production?
![[OC] How the Taylor Swift Eras Tour makes money](https://www.europesays.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/12/1bjr5va7gu7g1-1200x1024.png)
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Source:Â [https://www.readtrung.com/p/economics-of-taylor-swifts-2b-eras](https://www.readtrung.com/p/economics-of-taylor-swifts-2b-eras)
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$2 billion in tickets just for the chance to make like $400m in merch.
I bet resale sites made just as much as taylor did
Good god this is like half a fortune 500 company lol
What is that? A 30% margin? Pretty good. Most retail margins are under 5%
Would have been more interesting to cut it by ticket revenue – costs and merch revenue – costs, then adding those results together to get the net income before taxes.
Merch is doing an outsize fraction of the heavy lifting here compared to its 20% of revenue contribution.
The bonus she gave to the crew was almost 30% of the total income after taxes. That’s….. much more generous than I had expected.
2.5 billion in revenue!?! Jeeeeezus
I updated the image based on your feedback to show tickets vs merch more clearly.
https://preview.redd.it/r6bcxce9ku7g1.png?width=1200&format=png&auto=webp&s=37d40f639bd12990be98b1f374096eba4687a12a
It seems like everyone is making a good deal for what they are providing. Honestly expected worse
No advertising expense etc?
How do they set merch prices, do you suppose? How’s that conversation go…
“Well look, if we sell t-shirts at $25 apiece, we’re going to make $440m by the end of this tour!”
“Yeah… But if we sell t-shirts for $45 apiece, we’ll take home $650m.”
Is the promotor cut Ticketmaster/ live Nation? What a hustle all they do is run the website and process payments and they get that much.
She paid bonuses equal to 10% of revenue. Has there ever been a corporation pay bonuses like that?
Not total comp, bonuses? It appears comp is past of the $415m staging and production
$500M in merch is wild.
The profit margins are MASSIVE. You can get the same shirt from Aliexpress a month later, but people just bake the merch into the experience these days (and thus want authentic to tell the story of the show/waiting in line, etc.)
I go to 50 concerts a year and buy merch maybe once a year for a super rare show or from a band that barely tours.
Who gets the net earnings?
It stills blows my mind that, at all levels, it’s been normalised that venues get a cut of the merch sales. Rarely has a cut been less deserved
Nice leverage of tax law with the bonus structure. Kudos.
When you’re as popular as TS what more value could a promoter bring? The tickets would all be sold out even if it took waiting in line for days for hard tickets like back in the day. Why on earth would TS need a promoter at this level let alone paying such a ridiculous amount for them?
Promoter gets $200M! Promoting a Swift show is the easiest job in the world. Every show sold out as soon as it was announced.
Can someone ELI5 why Taylor Swift needs to spend $200 million on promoters?
That margin on the merch though.
I’m skeptical of those promoter cuts and stadium fees. By leg 2 this tour was a guaranteed sellout, if Taylor had competent lawyers and management (she does) there just isn’t any chance they’re paying the promoter 10% of ticket gross for zero risk.
Similar with venues, there’s just no way she gave up 30% of the gross, she probably kept close to 100%, with the venues all too happy to fill tens of thousands of seats full of beer and concessions buyers and paid parkers for those nights.
As stated plenty and downvoted to smithereens that crew bonus was a nice tax cutting number to the max, exactly 197. Not 195 not 200 but exactly 197.
They have the crew/performer bonus’ but not their actual regular wages. Unless I’m missing something. Oh, maybe that’s part of Staging and Production?
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