Taylor Swift Eras Tour UK: Could Swiftonomics really boost the British economy?

Taylor Swift’s ‘Eras’ tour is set to arrive in the UK in June, kicking off a string of dates that will see hundreds of thousands of Swifties flocking to major cities to catch the global megastar.

The singer is set to open her UK tour in Edinburgh on 7 June, playing a total of 15 shows and finishing in London on 20 August.

With millions of people registering for tickets in the UK, and those for her Wembley shows reportedly selling out in 14 minutes, the popstar’s tour will see the host cities flooded with throngs of Swifties in the latest Beatlemania-esque music craze.

Swiftonomics: The Eras tour is set to see over a million fans flock to concerts around the UK this summer

The singer’s shows even see masses of fans gathering outside of the venues despite not even having tickets.

Such is the popularity of superstar, the tour has already grossed more than the total GDP of a number of small countries, having amassed more than one billion dollars before the end of 2023.

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With the UK still in choppy economic waters, the star’s upcoming shows could provide a welcome boost to the economy, as the tour looks set to bring in an eye-watering £450million of Taylor Swift related spending from concert-goers, according to exclusive data for This is Money by JM Finn.

However, the wealth manager said the figure, while impressive and a ‘welcome contributor’ to the economy, is ‘hardly dial moving’.

JM Finn said the concerts, which are taking place at Murrayfield, Edinburgh; Principality Stadium, Cardiff; Anfield, Liverpool and Wembley, London, are expected to see more than 1.1 million attendees, with an average of 75,000 at each show.

On average, those attending the concerts are estimated to spend around £400 each, with costs covering everything from the tickets themselves (around £110 for a general admission standing ticket at presale last year), to food, hotels and travel.

Overnight stay: Travel and accommodation costs for fans travelling to cities makes up a large part of fan spending

Based on this, JM Finn said the whole UK section of the tour will make up around 0.08 per cent of the UK GDP, with the contribution calculated using the GDP in the fourth quarter of 2023 of £566.7billion.

As the tour dates are split over the second and third quarters, the wealth manager said it will account for 0.04 per cent each quarter.

Jack Summers, research assistant and JM Finn said: ‘Taylor Swift is a superstar with many fans across the UK prepared to spend a pretty penny to see her perform live in 2024, as the speed of sell outs and addition of new dates is testament to.

‘There are significant sums of money being spent on the Eras tour, with regional benefits set to be felt, but, unfortunately, it is unlikely to have a noticeable impact on UK GDP.’

In comparison, Question Pro data indicates an average spend across Taylor swift’s 53 Eras tour dates in the US of around $1,300 per head, or just over £1,000, pointing to higher travel and logistics costs due to the larger size of the US.

In total, the US leg of the tour is estimated to have added $4.96billion of spending to the US economy, which equates to $1.31billion in the third quarter alone, during which more than a quarter of the tour took place.

JM Finn said Swift’s tour may have contributed as much as 0.5 per cent to the US’ $265billion growth in the third quarter. Even this, the firm said, is insignificant to the US economy.

Summers added: ‘If fans hadn’t spent thousands of pounds on her tour, ask yourself would they have spent it on other GDP contributing factors? Maybe not to the same extent, but it would be a stretch to give too much faith to ‘swift-economics’.’