Marina Bay Sands: Home of the Swifties

Having transformed the country’s skyline and tourism landscape since it opened in 2010, Marina Bay Sands was looking to raise its profile as the destination to be in Asia.

Opportunity / Challenge

Whilst Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour was connected to the National Stadium, Culture Group explored the massive task of enabling Marina Bay Sands to be equally synonymous with the tour. We saw the opportunity for Marina Bay Sands to own a key cultural moment through a city-wide attraction by turning the entire campus into a canvas celebrating the Swiftie fandom.

Solution

Partnership

We aligned Marina Bay Sands with Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour, solidifying its cultural role as the Official Presenting Partner. Through the exclusive partnership, Marina Bay Sands became THE destination for Swifties — from tickets to merchandise, along with Tour-inspired programs and activations throughout the property, including its renowned hotel and luxury shopping mall.

Programs

We focused on three key areas: Ticketing, Stakeholder Management, and Creative Proposal.

For Ticketing, we streamlined processes, developed user journeys, and facilitated access for Marina Bay Sands team members. Additionally, we supported the consumer purchase journey, which was presented and aligned with Ticketmaster to ensure it can be implemented on the backend.

In Stakeholder Management, we arranged hospitality lounges at the Singapore National Stadium and coordinated operational details for VIP guests, inclusive of food and beverage and merch arrangements.

Our comprehensive Creative Proposal management led to a series of highly successful activities — inclusive of reviews and negotiations with key Artist stakeholders for approvals on all packages, content, and creative output — and impressed Swifties globally.

Highlighting this success was the Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour Trail, a unique, large-scale installation transforming Marina Bay Sands into an enchanting wonderland. This shift from a brand-centric role to celebrating fandom solidified Marina Bay Sands’ position as Singapore’s cultural campus.

Furthermore, we facilitated Marina Bay Sands hosting The Eras Tour Retail Pop-up, providing fans exclusive merchandise in a top-tier exhibition hall, ensuring a safe and comfortable shopping experience.

Impact

Marina Bay Sands commanded the cultural headlines across global, regional, and local publications in the days leading up to the shows, highlighting the variety of programs happening at the iconic building — in particular, the campus activation that Culture Group played a role in creating the idea and concept: the Taylor Swift Eras Trail. 

The efforts of Marina Bay Sands’ to celebrate a cultural moment will leave a lasting legacy within the hearts and minds of Swifties, and cement Marina Bay Sands’ iconic status as the undisputed cultural campus in Singapore and beyond.

Washington Post:

Marina Bay Sands, a luxury destination and a tour sponsor, set up a Swift-focused light show and mall trail with installations themed for each of the artist’s albums. Packages ranging from $7,500 to $35,000 were sold out, with 90 percent of the guests coming from overseas, “an indication of the strong tourism appeal of the Eras Tour,” said Chief Marketing Officer Irene Lin.”