The city-state went all out and supplied to a surging demand, reaping the rewards of a regional gap in the market.
According to Dictionary.com, the word “flex”, when used as slang, means to boast or brag; show off. Cambridge Dictionary, on the other hand, describes it as “to show that you are very proud or happy about something you have done or something you own, usually in a way that annoys people”.
Urban Dictionary simply equates a “flex” to making a statement.
In any case, when it comes to music and entertainment tourism, Singapore has been flexing hard and for good reason. Between announcing six Coldplay shows in 2024 and then rapidly confirming Taylor Swift’s The Eras Tour for another six, the city-state has become the music tourism epicenter of the region for the foreseeable future – and all because of a glaring regional pain point.
About a month ago, I wrote a piece about music tourism being largely overlooked as a significant booster to the travel industry and economy. It coincided with Coldplay’s announcement of a few shows in Southeast Asia, sans Singapore. My home turf, Kuala Lumpur, managed to secure a concert, which resulted in an incredible surge in demand from the region.
According to ticketing website GoLive Asia, Coldplay’s pre-sale tickets registered the biggest demand in GoLive Asia’s history, with a record-breaking 400,000 fans in the virtual queue. Other venues such as Perth and Indonesia garnered similar demand, resulting in hundreds of thousands of potential travellers left disappointed and unticketed.
Singapore swoops in with a strategy
Cue Singapore. Recognising a massive demand in the region and a largely underserved market, organisers began to pull together shows to cater to an eager customer base. In a matter of weeks, the city-state announced that Coldplay would be returning to Southeast Asia in 2024 for a six-day run in Singapore’s National Stadium. All shows were sold out in record time.
But it didn’t stop there.
In quick succession, Singapore announced Taylor Swift’s The Eras Tour for a six-day run at the National Stadium in March next year. Sam Smith announced his ‘Gloria’ tour would be coming to the Singapore Indoor Stadium in October this year, with tickets going on sale next week.
In fact, as I’m writing this, Marina Bay Sands is hosting the inaugural Where Music Takes Over festival, featuring 10 concerts by some of music’s hottest acts including David Tao, The 1975, Ellie Goulding, Sabrina Carpenter, and legendary shoegazers, The Strokes. The music festival started on July 15 and pulses all the way to August 2.
Economic and political benefits to music tourism
Okay, so a few of the world’s biggest chart-toppers are playing Singapore venues, big deal. So what?
So, everything. It’s a very big deal. The question from other regional players should be “Why couldn’t we have done this, too?”
Singapore’s position as a regional entertainment hub is not only an excellent branding exercise, it also creates a form of marketing that has widespread, long-ranging benefits – soft power. At our recent WiT Japan & North Asia event, economist Jesper Koll opened our eyes to the soft power of Japan – of the 25 highest grossing media franchises of all time, Japan owns a staggering 10, including pop culture juggernauts like Pokemon and Hello Kitty.
It’s like a Marina Bay Sands spokesperson told WiT, “Singapore has become the key destination of choice for many of the world’s best acts in the performing arts and pop scene, with a buzzing calendar of concerts and live entertainment events all year round. While Singapore is already a destination market, it is also seeing rising demand for entertainment tourism.”
“This can be seen by the solid slate of international acts coming to perform in our island republic, from pop icon Taylor Swift marking her only Asia stop apart from Japan in Singapore for her The Eras world tour, to being one of the only handful of cities in the region for Coldplay’s world tour next year.”
Agoda, yet another key player in the region, revealed an 8.7-fold increase in accommodation searches on the platform during the upcoming Coldplay concert series scheduled for January 2024.
Simple math – what does music tourism mean in numbers?
When Coldplay announced their lengthy Singapore stay while Malaysia struggled to add a second show to the list amidst certain controversies regarding Coldplay’s beliefs, Muar MP and President of political party MUDA, Syed Saddiq, took to social media to air his frustrations – saying Malaysia missed an economic lottery.
Let’s breakdown some numbers.
Singapore National Stadium boleh muat 50,000 orang.
Harga purata tiket RM600.
1 hari = RM30 juta
6 hari? Jumlah kutipan cecah RM180 juta, ataupun lebih.
— Syed Saddiq (@SyedSaddiq) June 20, 2023
[Translated] “Let’s breakdown the numbers. Singapore National Stadium fits 50,000 people. On average, a ticket costs RM600. That’s RM30mil a day. That’s RM180mil or more for six days.” The thread also includes the potential surge in flight bookings and spending by travellers and concertgoers in local destinations – for accommodation, food, and travel.
The math was echoed by tours and attractions booking platform, Klook, who are partnered with Taylor Swift’s The Eras Tour. The platform sold bundles that included tickets, hotel stays, and other activities for the inbound crowd.
Sarah Wan, General Manager, Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore, Klook said “We expected immense demand but safe to say that was an understatement with more than 600,000 fans from across the region eagerly waiting in line and willing to spend more than SG$1,700 on our Klook Experience Packages.”
Needless to say, the packages that encompass 40 hotels have completely sold out – with 4- and 5-star hotels selling out within two hours. The InterContinental (Cat 1) tickets sold out most quickly, followed by Grand Copthorne Waterfront (Cat 2), and Crowne Plaza Changi Airport (Cat 1).
Most traffic came from The Philippines, followed by Singapore, Indonesia, China, and Malaysia.
Tech that works – now that’s a flex
This sudden surge in music tourism has surfaced another pain point – janky technology.
Social media was abuzz with complaints from fans in line about glitchy ticketing platforms, unfair queue orders, system loopholes and scalpers during the chaotic rush to secure Coldplay tickets in Malaysia, Indonesia, and subsequently Singapore as well.
The issue was so serious that the Malaysian government had to intervene – announcing a possible law to curb scalpers and ticketing fraud in the future. It’s also something that industry players and travel professionals can potentially solve.
For example, Klook sent out a press release recently explaining how their platform didn’t buckle to the weight of 600,000 queuing Swifties when their packages went on sale. Long story short, it was a cocktail of a Content Delivery Network (CDN) system, Edge computing, and fraud prevention powered by Artificial Intelligence that created a digital tunnel capable of processing 10 million users queuing per second, and thousands of transactions each minute.
Bernie Xiong, CTO and co-founder of Klook, attributed the tech to the platform’s experience in handling complex bookings in the tours, attractions, and transportation verticals.
What’s next?
As mentioned, Singapore has secured its place as the music tourism epicenter for the next year or so. Personally, I think there are lessons to be learnt from the city-state’s aggressive approach in capturing underserved concertgoers in the region. Kudos to the live event organisers for working so swiftly (pun mildly intended) to make these shows and communal travel experiences happen.
If nothing else, Singapore buying the market wholesale has led to some great, unintentional social media buzz and content.
My favourite, by far, has to be this one.
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