Taylor Swift did something the football world thought was impossible: She made the NFL even more popular in the US
Jason Hanna/Getty Images
- Rumors had been circulating that Taylor Swift was dating Kansas City Chiefs star Travis Kelce.
- Swift attended a Chiefs game on Sunday and left a huge impact on the NFL.
- Fanatics, the NFL's top retailer, said sales of Kelce's jersey surged nearly 400% on Sunday.
It is Taylor Swift's world and now even the NFL is living in it.
Swift made a somewhat surprising visit to a Kansas City Chiefs game on September 24 as the guest of star tight end Travis Kelce. The pair were later seen leaving the game together, strengthening the rumors that the two have a blossoming relationship.
The impact has already been huge.
For example, Fanatics, the NFL's top retailer, told the Associated Press that sales of Kelce's jersey surged nearly 400% on Sunday alone.
Sites like ours are even helping all the new fans learn football's rules.
Jason Hanna/Getty Images
From an NFL perspective, this is big because it felt like the sport had already reached or was nearing saturation in the US. Attendance at games is actually up from pre-pandemic levels. In 2022, nearly 97% of all tickets were sold.
And then there is the Super Bowl, the ultimate gauge of the NFL's broad appeal. The total television and streaming viewership for that game has remained fairly steady, with the number of people watching typically falling in a narrow window of 110 and 115 million.
Then Swiftmania swept through the NFL, drowning out one of their biggest annual announcements.
Just a few hours before Swift was spotted at the game, the NFL revealed that Usher would be performing at the Super Bowl halftime show in February. Usually, that would be the biggest story in the sports and entertainment worlds, but this time, it was off the radar by mid-afternoon. Instead, the chatter focused primarily on Swift cheering next to Kelce's mother as the cameras panned to her throughout the game.
This is somewhat ironic, given the NFL reportedly asked Swift to do a Super Bowl halftime show last September, and she rejected them, but I digress.
The NFL has been searching for new fans
So how does a sport that big get bigger? In recent years, the NFL has made a strong push to expand its market overseas, especially in Europe, with the "NFL International Series," a select number of games each year that are played in other countries.
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The NFL already played games in London and Germany, but on the same day Swift attended the Chiefs game, ESPN reported that the league was preparing to play games in Brazil and Spain.
The NFL has even launched an "International Home Marketing Area" program where other countries are divvied up among NFL teams to market in and look for new fans without fighting each other.
That is a lot of effort to find new fans. Of course, it's the NFL, so it will probably work — nearly 800,000 people logged in to the ticket site for the Germany game with 120,000 seats.
Meanwhile, Swift shows up to a game and suddenly there is a surge of TikToks where people explain to their football-obsessed partners that Kelce will become famous now. Sure, it is a gag, but there is a level of truth to it.
@kelleylorraine_ It was way too easy to get him going with this😂 #marriedlife #couplecomedy #taylorswift #traviskelce
♬ original sound - kelleylorraine_
Before Sunday, Kelce wasn't even among the top 10 most popular jerseys for sale, according to the NFL. On Sunday, he was among the top five.
The NFL thought they needed to go overseas to get bigger. Maybe they just needed three hours of Taylor Swift in the stands.
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