How Beyoncé Turned Coachella Into The Super Bowl
Zack O'Malley Greenburg Forbes Staff
Senior Editor, Media & Entertainment
INDIO, CA - APRIL 14: Beyonce Knowles performs onstage during 2018 Coachella Valley Music And Arts Festival Weekend 1 at the Empire Polo Field on April 14, 2018 in Indio, California. (Photo by Kevin Winter/Getty Images for Coachella)
Beyoncé is one of only a handful of acts to play the Super Bowl twice — she starred in the game's halftime show in 2013 and 2016 — and three times if you count last weekend's Coachella gig, and four if you count tonight's as well. Allow me to explain.
When Beyoncé took the stage last Saturday, it was a significant occasion for several reasons. She became the first African-American woman to headline music's most celebrated festival, drawing rave reviews for a set that included appearances by Jay-Z, Destiny's Child and a full marching band. Pitchfork hailed her performance as "instantly legendary," while NBC dubbed it "an unprecedented celebration of black cultural influence in America." Beyoncé's star brought similar commercial gravity, helping pull 43 million fans into Coachella's YouTube livestream, nearly half the audience for the NFL's biggest game.
But the clearest way in which Beyoncé transformed Coachella into her own personal mid-April Super Bowl halftime show was this: while providing scores of fans with an unforgettable evening and creating a cultural moment that people will be talking about for quite some time, she simultaneously turned the music festival into an extremely effective infomercial for her own business ventures, from recorded music to live shows to the streaming service she co-owns.
The proof is in the numbers. Beyoncé's set last Saturday resulted in a 228% lift in digital song sales for her solo tracks as compared to the prior day, according to Nielsen (sales for the songs performed by Destiny's Child leapt 767%). That's actually more potent than the spike after Beyoncé's last actual Super Bowl gig, which gave her a 44.4% boost (though it's worth noting that change was week-over-week, as opposed to day-over-day--not exactly apples-to-apples, but close enough).
Merchandise is part of the financial picture, too. Were you so wowed by the Nefertiti outfit Beyoncé sported at Coachella that you developed an intense urge to immediately purchase a t-shirt or hoodie with the songstress-as-queen image on it? No problem: both items were already available on her website for $35 and $60, respectively.
INDIO, CA - APRIL 14: Beyonce Knowles performs onstage during 2018 Coachella Valley Music And Arts Festival Weekend 1 at the Empire Polo Field on April 14, 2018 in Indio, California. (Photo by Larry Busacca/Getty Images for Coachella )
Though Beyoncé will take home several million dollars for her Coachella gigs (in contrast to the uncompensated Super Bowl halftime show), the real prize is On The Run II, the stadium tour she and Jay-Z will co-headline starting in six weeks--as of today, tickets are still available for many of the 47 dates.
Statistics showing Coachella's impact on sales weren't immediately available, and representatives for both Live Nation and Beyoncé did not reply to requests for comment. But clearly, her YouTube-streamed set served to whet the appetites of fans around the globe who couldn't make it to Indio; her performance was a reminder that they can catch her in a nearby city this summer. This is another a Super Bowl tactic: acts like Madonna and Lady Gaga have used the halftime gig to push upcoming tours.
And there's yet another layer in this particular business cake. Everyone who purchases an On The Run II ticket online through the Live Nation and Ticketmaster site receives a free six-month subscription to Tidal, the streaming service Beyoncé co-owns with Jay-Z and a handful of other artists. One of the biggest challenges in a streaming space populated by well-funded giants like Spotify and Apple Music is user acquisition--and this summer, music's first couple will be bringing them in by the stadium load.
It would appear that Jay-Z and Beyoncé don't need the money: last year, they officially became a billion-dollar couple. But hey, everyone could use some extra cash to pay the bills--especially when you've got a $52.8 million mortgage. Directly and indirectly, Beyoncé's decision to turn Coachella into the Super Bowl should help cover at least a couple years of that.
For more on the business of Jay-Z and Beyoncé--including the full story on Tidal--get my new book 3 Kings: Diddy, Dr. Dre, Jay-Z and Hip-Hop's Multibillion-Dollar Rise and follow me on Twitter.
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Zack O'Malley Greenburg
Zack O'Malley Greenburg is senior editor of media & entertainment at Forbes and author of three books, including Empire State of Mind: How Jay-Z Went From Street...