There’s a new niche in the travel industry and its name is Taylor Swift, it seems.
With her concerts selling out at exorbitant prices in the United States, some Swifties are looking to the pop star’s European tour schedule—and reaching out to travel advisors to book them a trip around their ticket dates. Better still, budget seems to be only a minor issue.
“This whole concept of parents taking their teenagers to Taylor Swift concerts is an opportunity for travel advisors,” says Barbara Khan, luxury travel advisor at Journeys by the Book/Protravel Inc. in Tallahassee and Miami. She’s planning trips for two different clients in 2024, one in Lisbon in May and one in Milan in July.
Khan first became aware of Swift as an international phenomenon when her 28-year-old daughter tried in vain to get tickets in Seattle—and started checking for tickets in Amsterdam instead. Then she tried to plan a client’s vacation in Melbourne, but the hotels were sold out. When she reached out to her DMC to ask why, they said it was because of the Taylor Swift concert.
Then she got an email through the Protravel website (where she is listed as a European travel specialist) from a potential client who had tickets to a Swift concert in Milan and wanted to plan a family trip around it. Now the client, her husband and her two daughters, aged 22 and 17, will be doing a cruise of the Greek Isles, then a week in Italy (Rome and Florence so far) and then heading on to Milan for the concert.
Just a few days later Khan got an e-mail from another woman who has tickets in Lisbon for herself and her two teenage daughters. The client said it’s cheaper to buy the tickets there, and justified it as a great experience for her vacation.
“So we’re planning a trip in Portugal around it,” Khan says. “I love the whole idea. When you travel with children at that age, they become travelers for life. If I were going to a Taylor Swift concert and there was a choice between Utah and Lisbon, I definitely would choose Lisbon.”
In Bristol, VA, meanwhile, Johnna Hernandez of A Magical Traveler recently had a customer looking for a student tour in Europe who suddenly scored some Taylor Swift tickets—and ended up planning a two-week mother-daughter trip.
“It’s a thing, it’s like taking over the world,” Hernandez says. “Apparently these tickets are really hard to get in the United States, but they got them in London—and now they’re just making a big production out of it, and she has asked me to build a trip around the date.”
They will start with flights to London, spend three nights in hotels, see the concert, and then take a Globus tour around England.
“I’ve had some strange requests, but this is an interesting one, I’m not gonna lie,” Hernandez says. But she’s happy for the business, of course, referred to her by a client for whom she planned an earlier Europe trip. “After all is said and done, it’s going to be easily $14,000,” she says. “I’m glad Taylor Swift is bringing a little business into the travel industry. I’ve heard of travel advisors who build their business around sports teams, so I guess this is sort of in that vein.”
Does she plan to promote her Europe expertise to other Swifties?
“There is definitely a story here with some legs,” she says. “I’m not going to get a group together and say let’s go to a concert—that’s not my jam. But I do quite a bit of social media and I’m definitely going to be highlighting this experience. I’m going to talk about it, and the ins and outs of all of it, because it was quite a challenge to find the right tour. We did some work to pull this all together.”
Emily Barton, owner of Scenic Routes Travel in Arkansas, meanwhile, agrees she too will “absolutely promote this, now that I know it’s a thing.”
She has just begun planning a trip for one of her clients, who will travel to Vienna for a Swift concert with two teenaged Swiftie daughters and her best friend. But first, they will be going to Munich and Salzburg.
Given the hype around these concerts, Barton says the most important thing is to get the hotels booked “before the prices jump up” and while there is still occupancy. Next, she will work on the flights and activities for this eight-day girls’ trip.
Jeff Kerber at Warp One Travel in McKinney, Texas, isn’t so sure. He is indeed planning a trip around a Taylor Swift concert for a client who connected with him over Twitter. As of now, they are looking at a self-drive tour from Oslo to Gothenburg to Stockholm and several active tours including biking and rock climbing, “a very different itinerary than is my norm,” he says.
While he is happy to have a new client, he doesn’t plan to actually market this kind of travel. “I don’t think it’s a niche worthy of an investment,” he says, “because the draw for Taylor Swift is far greater than for other artists.”
Meanwhile, at The Travel Mechanic in Raleigh, Lauren Doyle just yesterday took a deposit from a new client who arrived via a local mom’s group on Facebook. The woman has scored tickets to Swift’s Milan concert in July for herself and her two girls, aged 13 and 17—and she, too, is building a family trip to Italy around it.
Doyle has booked them two nights in Milan; then they will go to the concert; and then take a train to Florence and a tour of Tuscany—10 days in all. Doyle will deliver travel documents and brochures in “a whole Italy-themed surprise box” that the mom will give the girls as their Christmas present.
After having recently uprooted the family to move to Raleigh, the mom “is trying to brighten up their year—and this is a great way to do it,” Doyle says.
It’s brightened up Doyle’s year as well. “I’m thinking I will share the story of this mom and how you can turn a concert into something even more memorable,” she says. “I love the idea of surprising the girls at Christmas, and I think it’s something travel advisors can really start advertising.”
Indeed, the idea of giving travel as a gift is something she hopes more people will consider as the festive season approaches. “I have customers who gift travel; this woman thought of it because she is well-traveled herself. But most people don’t think of it,” Doyle says.
Who knows what that idea, combined with her new expertise in selling Taylor Swift travel, will bring?
“I’m definitely going to share this story on Facebook and Instagram,” and find out, she says. “When you build any niche, you have to bring it to people’s attention over and over again.”
Cheryl’s 40-year career in journalism is bookended by roles in the travel industry, including Executive Editor of Business Travel News in the 1990s, and recently, Editor in Chief of Travel Market Report and admin of Cheryl Rosen’s Group for Travel Professionals, a news and support group on Facebook. As an independent contractor since retiring from the 9-to-5 to travel more, she has written regular articles about the life and business of travel agents for Luxury Travel Advisor, Travel Agent, and Insider Travel Report. She also writes and edits for professional publications in the financial services, business, and technology sectors.