When Taylor Swift’s new album Life of a Showgirl released 3rd October 2025, around 500 Target stores stayed open for the midnight release to sell physical copies, including a vinyl variant.
But how much impact does a new album really have on Target and the wider retail industry? Long story short, a lot!
There’s a reason why the term “Swiftonomics” (Swift-economics) was coined by a Bloomberg reporter back in 2022. The impact Swift fans have on retail is no small thing. Let’s get into the numbers.
Key takeaways:
- Compared to the previous Saturday, October 4th 2025 saw an increase in visits of over 36.06% to Target stores.
- The release week of The Life of a Showgirl (10/03 – 10/10) saw Target’s visits jump up by +4.61 year-on-year with visits peaking on the day after the midnight release October 4th, and the following Saturday October 11th.
- Evermore saw Swift fans flock to Target as the retailer received over 8 million visits on release day and the following day, while other albums such as Life of a Show Girl saw just over 7 million visits in a day to Target on release day.
Album releases by Taylor Swift drop at midnight (ET) around Friday, giving fans a fun experience of staying up late to hear the album streamed or have release parties, going in-store to buy on the release day, and plenty of time at the weekend to pick up the album.
Since Swift’s albums drop on release, we’ve taken a look at release day and the following day to get a better idea of shopper trends as while some fans will queue for the midnight release, others choose to wait for the following day to pop in-store.
Release week rankings
First, we analyzed Taylor Swift’s last five albums (excluding re-recordings) to see the visit impact of fans week-on-week to Target stores. This shows the percent increase of traffic week-on-week, which has Evermore at first place in our rankings.
By this metric, this album captured a moment for shoppers and fans alike when the album release was an in-person event in December 2020 to relieve the pressure and isolation of lockdowns. By the numbers, Evermore saw more than 2 million consumers to Target stores on release day compared to Folklore (as Folklore was released during July, six months before Evermore, during the height of the pandemic).
By the numbers, Evermore saw visits of over 8 million on release day and the following day, closely coming out on top compared to Midnights, TTPD, and Life of a Show Girl all of which saw around 7.5 million visits on release day followed by over 8 million. Folklore is unique for its less than 6 million visits on release day, due to its release during the pandmic lockdowns.
What remains consistent is Swift’s fans eagerness to get the album – it is only during the height of lockdown that fans turned to alternatives. Brick-and-mortar retailers, not just Target, can remain confident in the strength of Swiftonomics to boost physical sales during album release week.
Life of a Show Girl
The weak of release of The Life of a Showgirl (10/03 – 10/10) saw Target’s visits jump up by +4.61 year-on-year with visits peaking on the day after the midnight release October 4th, and the following Saturday October 11th.
Week on week, Life of a Show Girl saw visits increase by +7.09. Compared to the previous Saturday, October 4th saw an increase in visits of over 36%.
Release day visits are comparable to The Tortured Poets Department (TTPD), though Swift’s previous album, with visits to Target stores being -4.058% lower than than the release day of TTPD.
Life of a Show Girl has been unique for its vast amount of sales. Swift has sold over 4 million equivalent album units in the United States; driven by a combination of physical sales (in-store and preorder delivery), record-breaking sales of vinyl copies, and streaming numbers. Over 30 versions of the album were released, each with a different artwork and some with different versions of tracks which induldged collector-fans.
While Life of a Showgirl has been Swift’s greatest success in commercial numbers thus far, in terms of store visits t Target it is on-par with her previous album The Tortured Poets Department in its release week.
The Tortured Poets Department
Released 19 April 2024, The Tortured Poets Department was Swift’s lyrical eleventh studio album, expanded into a double album subtitled The Anthology two hours after the initial release in an eventful surpise for fans. This turned the midnight release into a viral sensation and the following morning (we’ll sure even non-fans will remember!) the internet was alight with takes and analysis. But what did it do for retail?
Release day was a major success for Target who saw visits on April 19th compared to previous week were up by over 36%. The following day visits were up by 18.42% compared to the previous week.
Visits were down in the middle of the release week compared to the previous week, suggesting that the surge of Swift fans prefer to shop for the release on around the weekend as visits were back up again from Friday to Sunday. On average, however, this release week saw visits of +7.12% higher than the previous week, showing great sustained interest to Target stores.
Midnights
Midnights was Swift’s tenth studio album, a concept album inspired by her thoughts late at night. The album dropped at midnight (ET) October 21 2022, the first album of Swift’s since the pandemic other than the Fearless (Taylor Swift version, a rerecording of a previous album).
Release week for Midnights saw visits increase by 5.7% week on week and 2.52% year on year. October 21nd typically benefits from Halloween foot traffic which could explain the lower impact year-on-year than other releases on Target specifically.
Visits on October 21st were +33% higher compared to the previous week, seeing fans flock to stores for the release. The following day, visits numbered over 8.5 million and were 11.4% higher than the same day of the previous week.
Visits dropped from Monday to the middle of the week, then back to over 7 million on the next Friday, consistent with other releases and general Target traffic trends.
Evermore
By Decermber 11th, when Evermore released, lockdown measures had eased and many Americans were making plans for Christmas. Evermore was Swift’s ninth studio album, the sister album to its predecsessor Folklore which was released only 6 months before, and both were made during the COVID-19 lockdown. Were fans put off going in-store to get the album or did the ease of lockdown measures make them all the more eager for an in-person experience?
Our data shows the latter is more likely. Evermore saw Swift fans flock to Target as the retailer received over 8 million visits on release day and the following day, while other albums such as Life of a Show Girl saw just over 7 million visits in a day to Target on release, followed by a day of over 8 million. It seems fans were eager for an in-store experience upon release. This trend can also be seen in the week-on-week data, where consumers visits to Target jumped by over 33% on December 11th compared to the same day of the previous week.
However, this impact didn’t sustain to the next day, though it could be that early holiday shoppers also had an impact week-on-week to keep numbers similar.
On average, Evermore’s release week saw a +7.76% increase in traffic week-on-week to Target.
Folklore
Folklore was Swift’s eighth studio album and was an unexpected release on July 24th 2020. Due to the pandemic, Swift cancelled her tour for her seventh studio album Lover (2019) and wrote Folklore while in lockdown.
From March 15 2020, states began to implement shutdowns to combat the spread of COVID-19. Many states at the time of Folklore’s release had seen state-wide curfews and some (including California, Michigan, and Indiana) postponed re-opening plans just over a week before Swift’s album was released. In the middle of a time of isolation, did this album have an impact on store visits?
There’s no doubt visits were impact by the pandemic. On release day, visits to Target stores were over 2 million less than the release numbers of Evermore. It wasn’t just fans that didn’t show up in-store – in general, consumers were staying inside.
On release day, visits increased by over 27.09%. Week on week, visits jumped up by +5.29%, compared to The Tortured Poets Department. Even in the pandemic, the Swift-effect was clearer than ever.
What about other retailers?
Target wasn’t the only retailer to see an impact from Swift’s new album.
FYE, a record store chain, has around 120 stores in the US. Visits were +3.06% higher compared to the previous week during the release week of Life of a Showgirl, with both October 3 and 4th seeing an over 12% in traffic.
And Barnes & Noble, the popular book retailer also carries CDs and vinyl. The retailer did see an impact year-on-year of +4.13%, indicating some fans did go to the book retailer for the new album, but when we look at release week data we see it didn’t give as much benefit as other events around this time, such as the release of dak fantasy novel Alchemised by SenLinYu which happened only a week before. Week-on-week during Life of a Showgirl’s release, visits were down to Barnes on Noble by -22.33% we suspect for this reason.
What does Swiftonomics mean for retailers?
Unlike many trends in the retail industry, Swiftonomics is only on the up. Swift fans are eager to shop in-store to meet other fans and have a good, memorable experience on release day or week. Retailers can continue to learn from this and see how this can be replicated to other releases, not just Swift albums, but few cultural events will have the impact of a Swift album.
