The Box Office Buzz, Tracking, and Pre-Sale Thread

[Relevation]

4 hours ago, Relevation said:

Combining for an adjusted total ceiling for Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour of $395,547,000. 

 

NOW, all it has to do to beat Endgame is hit 90.28% capacity, and to hit my projected $300M OW, it has to hit a remarkably doable 75.84% capacity.

I just ran the math today, it is possible for The Eras Tour to beat Endgame and the showings are already there. I’m not even saying The Eras Tour will beat Endgame but if it doesn’t then it won’t be due to a lack of OW capacity because the capacity is there. And I ran that math off an estimated 4000 theater count, which could totally go up. 
 

I also disagree with the notion that this has to pull non-Swifties to get to opening numbers that high. A March 2023 poll from Morning Consult showed that a full 16% of the US population identifies as Swifties, not even counting all Taylor Swift fans which count over half the country. Ticketmaster said that 14 million people attempted to get tickets for The Eras Tour on day one of presales and only 1.5 million were actually successful. If that excess number all go to this concert film then that alone gets you to $262M. Taylor Swift literally has 54 million avid fans in this country alone and she can 100% mobilize enough of them to hit the roughly 17 million admissions needed to beat Endgame.

 

So tldr, there is enough capacity and enough Swifties to beat Avengers: Endgame. Now I don’t think Swift will actually pull this off but it’s worth giving this potential outcome serious consideration.

[ChipDerby]

I think it's hilarious that it's even a remote possibility of beating Endgame

[Cap]

2 hours ago, XXR's Eras Tour said:

She would “only” need to sell about 17 million tickets OW to dethrone Endgame. She has the fanbase to do it, if enough decide they’re interested in this particular endeavor.

I, anecdotally, go back to the old female movie going trope: it doesn’t matter how soon you see it, it matters you see it with your squad. 

 

She kind of has forced people’s hands by doing it weekend onlys. But all the crazy ass Taylor Moms I know have been talking about: “when can I go when there is less crowds for my kids” and “when are we all going in a group.” Etc, etc. 

 

and as I pointed out before, other than her like die-hard, die-hard, I need to do everything on the first day fans, there is no spoiler/immediacy factor to this. It’s not like she’s premiering a new song that you can only hear if you go see the movie. It’s a concert that you can watch on TikTok for free. 

 

I have zero doubt she could sell 17 million tickets. I have zero doubt she could sell 30 million tickets. And I’ve seen enough numbers here to know it’s going to be huge. 
 

but is the first weekend FOBO really going to dictate people willing to take a shitty seats instead of just waiting to the second weekend for good ones. 

[Cap]

1 hour ago, keysersoze123 said:

growth in shows to see big increase.

My dumbass local theater has four showings sold out for Friday night, and has yet to add more. 
 

Saturday’s super open for seats though, so maybe they’re just trying to force people to spill over to the next day.

 

The other theater, owned by the same independent company, in the town over, is basically running the same way. I also don’t know if they change their seats, but it appears that they don’t have it in the giant theater that sat like 300 people… and I’m so confused why it’s not playing in there? Like do they really think anything else is going to fill that theater?

[Ledmonkey96]

Regardless the big winner are the theaters i'd say, the small chain i work at is keeping >50% of the ticket revenue and i'd assume that's pretty common.

[vale9001]

27 minutes ago, Ledmonkey96 said:

Regardless the big winner are the theaters i'd say, the small chain i work at is keeping >50% of the ticket revenue and i'd assume that's pretty common.

 

43% was reported. The average for every movie should be at around 50%. But this has a locked very high ticket price so the exhibitors will make a lot more money for every ticket than basically any other movie. Nothing they can't blame for i would say 😅

 

Interesting fact about the possibile promotion of this: i have read in a very unusual way the box office scores of this tour have not been made public from her team despite the american leg being over. According to estimations the tour should be the biggest american concert leg ever. So it's very likely they purposely decided to make the numbers official only days before the "movie" to get the headlines about "the biggest tour in america" you can now watch on cinemas in few days. 

Edited September 3, 2023 by vale9001

[Porthos]

On 9/1/2023 at 11:59 PM, Porthos said:

 

Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour Greater Sacramento Area Opening Night Seat Report:

T-42 days and counting

 

	Capped	Sellouts	Showings	Seats left	Total Seats	Seats Sold	Perct Sold
TOTALS	0	1	130	11537	17553	6016	34.27%

 

Total Showings Added Today	7
Total Seats Added Today	944
Total Seats Sold Today	774

 

Day Two Comps:    [NO ADJUSTMENTS MADE FOR ATP DIFFERENCE IN COMPS]

	%		Sold Day 2	Total Sold		Sellouts Shows	Seats Left Total Seats	Perct Sold		Final Sold	% of Final		Comp
NWH	41.09		1361	14640		0/273	19521/34161	42.86%		28183	21.35%		20.55m
MoM	81.26		654	7403		0/329	33513/40916	18.09%		21117	28.49%		29.26m
Thor 4	127.35		563	4724		0/228	26876/31600	14.95%		16962	35.47%		36.93m
BP2	161.59		469	3723		0/292	32828/36551	10.19%		16800	35.81%		45.25m
AM3	214.78		782	2801		0/231	29564/32365	8.65%		10475	57.43%		37.59m

FINAL SOLD NOTES: "Final sold" is the number of tickets sold for the movie in question at stop of tracking while "% of final" is the percentage of The Era Tour's current tickets sold versus that final number.

 

Regal:     1866/6150  [30.34% sold]

 

% of Final Totals: [NO ADJUSTMENTS MADE FOR ATP DIFFERENCE WHATSOEVER]

66.95% of Avatar 2's final total           [11.38m]

130.19% of Oppenheimer's final total [13.67m]

49.81% of Barbie's final total               [11.11m]

 

===

 

Very nice Day 2, IMO.  AM3 comp did drop, yes.  But that had a funky rollout with a non-standard initial ticket drop time that probs affected D2.  All other comps either rose or were more or less flat.

 

Gonna keep it in Day x for at least a couple more days.  Then will likely go dark on comps for a couple of days before thinking about bringing in BP2 on its first day of sales (T-38), as I don't have anything else remotely suitable.  As usual, play it by ear.

 

Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour Greater Sacramento Area Opening Night Seat Report:

T-41 days and counting

 

	Capped	Sellouts	Showings	Seats left	Total Seats	Seats Sold	Perct Sold
TOTALS	0	1	131	11365	17736	6371	35.92%

 

Total Showings Added Today	1
Total Seats Added Today	183
Total Seats Sold Today	355

 

Day 3 Comps:    [NO ADJUSTMENTS MADE FOR ATP DIFFERENCE IN COMPS]

	%		Sold Day 3	Total Sold		Sellouts Shows	Seats Left Total Seats	Perct Sold		Final Sold	% of Final		Comp
NWH	41.73		628	15268		0/298	21158/36426	41.92%		28183	22.61%		20.86m
MoM	81.45		419	7822		0/329	33094/40916	19.12%		21117	30.17%		29.32m
Thor 4	125.91		336	5060		0/228	26540/31600	16.01%		16962	37.56%		36.51m
BP2	158.60		294	4017		0/292	32534/36551	10.99%		16800	37.92%		44.41m
AM3	208.34		257	3058		0/231	29307/32365	9.45%		10475	60.82%		36.46m

FINAL SOLD NOTES: "Final sold" is the number of tickets sold for the movie in question at stop of tracking while "% of final" is the percentage of The Era Tour's current tickets sold versus that final number.

 

Regal:     1942/6150  [31.58% sold]

 

% of Final Totals: [NO ADJUSTMENTS MADE FOR ATP DIFFERENCE WHATSOEVER]

70.90% of Avatar 2's final total           [12.05m]

137.87% of Oppenheimer's final total [14.47m]

52.75% of Barbie's final total               [11.76m]

 

===

 

Pace looks to be starting to slow down a tiny tic versus big MCU films*.  But it also is out a good deal longer than all of the above except for BP2 (which is only a handful of days difference), so timing is a reasonable culprit as well.  Still, NWH rose a tiny tic, MoM was flat-ish, Thor 4 dropped a tiny bit, and some slight erosion with BP2 and AM3.

* Cue the CRUMBLING gifs and memes.

 

Do have some other observations about buying patterns locally, but gonna hold off a few more days to see if the patterns continue to form or not.

Edited September 5, 2023 by Porthos

[misterpepp]

Apologies if this is already known, but there will be early access shows for The Creator on Sep 27. I'm keeping an eye out for when they go on sale, should be before general tix if Venice is anything to go by.

[vafrow]

9 hours ago, BoxOfficeFangrl said:

Just saying, the latest OW record has usually lasted 4-5 years at the most and the Eras movie will be released about 4.5 years after Endgame...

 

To be more precise, Lost World: Jurassic Park held the OW record for the longest period of time, at 1642 days, or just shy of 4.5 years.

 

For Endgame to pass that record, it has to hold until  October 24, 2023.

[vafrow]

18 hours ago, vafrow said:

 

Taylor Swift Eras Tour, southern Ontario, D1, hour 22, T-42ish (noon data pull)

 

Total sales:  19,275

New Sales: 2,653

Growth from yesterday: 16%

Theatre Count:  50

Showtimes:  214*

Tickets per showtime: 90.1

Coverage Radius: 143km

Estimated population coverage: 8-10M

Theatres Tracked: MTC4

 

Again, no comps for this regional coverage outside recent films, so comparing against pulls from morning of just to get scale.

 

11.15x T-1 Blue Beetle

21.71x T-1 Equalizer

27.34x T-1 Gran Turismo

 

Some data observations:

 

-Increased showtimes appear to be from IMAX evening showings. These finally opened up after Exorcist moved. They must have just happened this morning because sales are light, but I expect every seat of these shows to sell out eventually.

 

-Reminder that in Canada, showtimes appear to be allowed to start earlier, with some from 12:30. However, a lot of theatres don't open for matinees on weekdays. I'm guessing that in time, they'll expand hours ( both earlier and later shows) and add capacity, but, that may happen closer to the date.

 

-I still don't know what an ideal growth rate is beyond opening day, but 16% feels pretty good. The prime shows remain almost fully sold, so growth has come from people buying earlier shows it seems. I haven't checked Saturday or other day sales formally, but I'm also guessing that has absorbed a lot of demand.

 

-Base ticket prices for the market for MTC4 runs from $10.75 to $13.50 usually. Those are all charging $19.89 Canadian. Surcharges for AVX (chain branded Dolby screen) and IMAX are being added for those shows.

 

More time is always needed to fully assess, but, I'm still thinking of this in the $50M range more based on feel, and looking to see if the trends and data point away from that in either direction,, and nothing does at this stage yet. 

 

Taylor Swift Eras Tour, southern Ontario, D1, hour 22, T-41 (8 am pull)

 

Total sales:  19,499

New Sales: 224

Growth from yesterday: 1%

Theatre Count:  50

Showtimes:  214*

Tickets per showtime: 91.1

Coverage Radius: 143km

Estimated population coverage: 8-10M

Theatres Tracked: MTC4

 

Observations

 

The update is under 24 hours from yesterday, and it's a Saturday night of a long weekend, but, it's a very clear slowdown. In absolute terms, any other movie selling 224 tickets on its third day, 6 weeks out would be considered a tremendous performance, but it's not the avalanche we saw initially.

 

-The 7:00 pm IMAX showings are not selling much since being available yesterday. This is probably the best viewing experience at the peak time. For it not to be selling, it means that the die hards already have their seats, and word probably hasn't spread about their availability to others.

 

-Even with the slowdown, I don't think it's too alarming. I was at a family event last night. Met up with other people with kids that are preteen to teenage years. People hadn't heard about this yet. These are people that go to concerts, and like Taylor Swift. People are busy right now with back to school around here. The rumors that this was supposed to be only announced next week until the story broke (BOT exclusive!) makes sense, as it generally shouldn't be something announced right before a long weekend.

[TwoMisfits]

10 hours ago, across the Jat verse said:

May be I will be wrong because who knows how this plays out but from my experience yall need to slow down. This isnt normal movie to have normal presales run. I won’t be surprised with ”just” $100-150M weekend.

 

That's where I am, too, for a weekend performance right now...BUT, as someone mentioned above, Taylor's fans can be nuts, and if they think a record is possible, who knows what they are willing to do.

 

I'm not her fanbase, but I get crazy fandom.  So, the last week will be very interesting to see what her fans and their friends/families do.

 

And what theaters do.  I mean, if holdovers are awful, who knows if she gets an Endgame-like set (like 70-80% of all available theater showings at 16s and below)...if she does, all bets are off.  

[vafrow]

I have a general question for people. I've never been to any concert film, and certainly not as hyped as this.

 

What is the expected audience reaction vibe here? Are people going to be going and treating it like a concert experience? Are people going to be standing up and singing along? Or will people treat this as a typical movie. Are they going to sit relatively quiet and take it all in.

 

I'm not sure what some of the other big debut concert films have been like (Bieber, One Direction, etc.). 

 

We also don't know if this is a full concert rebroadcast, or if there's more documentary approach between songs. I feel like it's going to be more the former (especially as top end concerts these days often integrate in a bit of narrative filler between sets anyways). But, I don't think I've seen that confirmed.

 

All of this to bring back to the tracking thread, is that the type of experience people are looking for might dictate the demand. Getting to a friday or Saturday showing at peak time, even with bad seats, may be preferable to a Sunday matinee in week 3 if you're looking for the atmosphere. 

[vale9001]

14 minutes ago, vafrow said:

I have a general question for people. I've never been to any concert film, and certainly not as hyped as this.

 

What is the expected audience reaction vibe here? Are people going to be going and treating it like a concert experience? Are people going to be standing up and singing along? Or will people treat this as a typical movie. Are they going to sit relatively quiet and take it all in.

 

I'm not sure what some of the other big debut concert films have been like (Bieber, One Direction, etc.). 

 

We also don't know if this is a full concert rebroadcast, or if there's more documentary approach between songs. I feel like it's going to be more the former (especially as top end concerts these days often integrate in a bit of narrative filler between sets anyways). But, I don't think I've seen that confirmed.

 

All of this to bring back to the tracking thread, is that the type of experience people are looking for might dictate the demand. Getting to a friday or Saturday showing at peak time, even with bad seats, may be preferable to a Sunday matinee in week 3 if you're looking for the atmosphere. 

 

 

well swift audience is now most adults and  some of them have kids husbands and wifes...so i don't think it's gonna be somethng totally caotic. Certainly you can probably expect people to sing to songs.

 

time ago i saw videos from cinema screenings of billie eilish concert ( so basically all kids- very young people in their early 20s) and it was literally a concert with people jumping and everything 😅

 

 

As everything the problem now is tik tok and all the need to get viral videos. If you are not lucky you should find the person, even not fan, going there to make the video where he screams to get viral and everything...

 

 

for the other question: is all the concert, only songs. 

Edited September 3, 2023 by vale9001

[keysersoze123]

On 9/1/2023 at 8:08 AM, keysersoze123 said:

Taylor Swift Eras Tour MTC1

Sat - 296446/1301748 6310498.94 6964 shows

Taylor Swift Eras Tour MTC1 Sat - 362972/1514718 7804508.08 8601 shows

 

2 days later. This is where I am expecting most growth with Friday shows being limited. Here I am expecting 1m+ tickets to be sold by release date. May be as much as 1.2m which could be close to 25m !!!

[XXR & Friends]

@vafrow My expectation is to expect most everyone to at least be singing. There will be some level of dancing I’m sure but it’ll be severally muted compared to the actual concert.

 

And to clarify, this is her full concert. No documentary footage intertwined (except maybe at the beginning as a lead in.)

[XXR & Friends]

As a side note to growth patterns and sales rates, keep in mind that this will not likely have any kind of standard promotion (i.e commercials) so there will be a bit of a boom and bust cycle as Taylor promotes the film intermittently. Perhaps they’ll have a more mainstream marketing attack in the final week or two to give the GA an idea of what’s happening.

[TheFlatLannister]

10 hours ago, across the Jat verse said:

May be I will be wrong because who knows how this plays out but from my experience yall need to slow down. This isnt normal movie to have normal presales run. I won’t be surprised with ”just” $100-150M weekend.

Under $150M feels a bit too low imo. Initial presales volume and ATP gets it there I think. An opening between “over Barbie and under TFA” wouldn’t shock me. 

[vafrow]

25 minutes ago, XXR's Eras Tour said:

As a side note to growth patterns and sales rates, keep in mind that this will not likely have any kind of standard promotion (i.e commercials) so there will be a bit of a boom and bust cycle as Taylor promotes the film intermittently. Perhaps they’ll have a more mainstream marketing attack in the final week or two to give the GA an idea of what’s happening.

 

Are we confident there won't be a traditional promotional campaign? I can see why they wouldn't do one now, but, it would make sense to ramp things up in the final two weeks at least.

[katnisscinnaplex]

On 9/2/2023 at 8:08 AM, katnisscinnaplex said:

Movie	Day	Area	TC	Shows	New	Sold	Seats	% Sold
Greek Wedding	T-5	Jax	5	13	4	35	1,351	2.59%
		Phx	6	16	0	26	1,490	1.74%
		Ral	7	17	5	25	1,877	1.33%
	Total		18	46	9	86	4,718	1.82%
Nun II	T-5	Jax	5	38	17	65	5,218	1.25%
		Phx	5	19	8	67	3,256	2.06%
		Ral	8	36	7	41	5,093	0.81%
	Total		18	93	32	173	13,567	1.28%

 

Greek Wedding T-5 comps

 - Magic Mike 3 - .528x (528k)

 - 80 for Brady (Total) - .229x (290k)

 - Joy Ride (Total) - .573x (631k)

 - Strays (Total) - .86x (946k)

 - Easter Sunday - 1.755x (878k)

 - I Wanna Dance - .503x (367k)

 - No Hard Feelings (Total) - .735x (1.54m)

 - Dog - missed

 - Marry Me - missed

 - West Side Story - missed

 

Size adjusted average - 880k

 

The Nun II T-5 comps

 - Insidious 5 - .906x (4.53m)

 - Smile (Total) - missed

 - Scream VI - .178x (1.01m)

 - Black Phone (Total) - .66x (1.98m)

 - Candyman - 1.648x (3.13m)

 - Nope - .275x (1.76m)

Movie	Day	Area	TC	Shows	New	Sold	Seats	% Sold
Greek Wedding	T-4	Jax	5	13	4	39	1,351	2.89%
		Phx	6	16	5	31	1,490	2.08%
		Ral	7	17	-2	23	1,877	1.23%
	Total		18	46	7	93	4,718	1.97%
Nun II	T-4	Jax	5	38	8	73	5,218	1.40%
		Phx	5	19	23	90	3,256	2.76%
		Ral	8	36	9	50	5,093	0.98%
	Total		18	93	40	213	13,567	1.57%

 

Greek Wedding T-4 comps

 - Magic Mike 3 - .505x (505k)

 - 80 for Brady (Total) - .226x (287k)

 - Joy Ride (Total) - .544x (598k)

 - Strays (Total) - missed

 - Easter Sunday - 1.632x (816k)

 - I Wanna Dance - .531x (388k)

 - No Hard Feelings (Total) - missed

 - Dog - missed

 - Marry Me - missed

 - West Side Story - missed

 

Size adjusted average - 661k

 

Been a rough few days for this.

 

The Nun II T-4 comps

 - Insidious 5 - .91x (4.55m)

 - Smile (Total) - missed

 - Scream VI - .203x (1.16m)

 - Black Phone (Total) - missed

 - Candyman - 1.677x (3.19m)

 - Nope - .299x (1.91m)

[XXR & Friends]

8 minutes ago, vafrow said:

 

Are we confident there won't be a traditional promotional campaign? I can see why they wouldn't do one now, but, it would make sense to ramp things up in the final two weeks at least.

Not confident, no. They may not originally planned a traditional marketing campaign but now that it looks like this could be a top 10 all time opening they may try to pick it up soon.