Fans attending Taylor Swift’s Eras tour have continued to express their dismay over the lengthy lines to purchase merchandise, with videos showing the extensive queues ahead of each concert.
Swift will be performing at NRG Stadium in Houston, Texas, this weekend during the latest stop on her highly anticipated tour. Although her first concert in the city isn’t until Friday evening on 21 April, fans have made their way to the stadium early for a specific reason: Eras tour merchandise.
In a video posted to Twitter by KHOU11, the news station captured the long line of fans waiting outside of the stadium Friday morning. The footage, which appeared to be captured by drone, showed the line wrapped around the entire block of a street.
Multiple fans could be seen sitting on the ground to wait, while others had blankets wrapped around them as they maintained their place in line for the opportunity to purchase the tour-branded merchandise.
On Twitter, fans have reshared the video while expressing their shock over the long lines for the merch.
“I’m so confused. I’ve been to stadium concerts before and merch lines have never been this long,” one person wrote, while another responded: “It’s a no for me.”
A third wrote: “Houston line for merch is WILD, truly the tour of the century.”
Fans also pointed out that, after seeing how long the lines are, they’d rather buy Eras merchandise online, with many questioning why others weren’t doing that already.
“Taylor put merch online for a reason,” one person pointed out. “Let’s not sit outside for a T-shirt. Also the reason artists put their merch online is for those who didn’t go to a show, if you don’t have tickets to an Eras tour show don’t wait outside and make the line longer for those going to the show.”
“Am I the only one who has no desire to purchase merch at the Eras tour??” another added. “If it’s in stock online… I’ll just take that instead of a massive line on a stressful day (to each their own though ily)”
The lines were partially the result of NRG Stadium’s event on 20 April: “Early Merch Day.” The sale began at 10am and went until 7pm, with merchandise being sold on a first come first serve basis, according to the stadium’s Instagram post. The sale was also open to the general public, with fans not requiring tickets to the tour to take part in the event.
Along with the lines in Houston, fans have expressed how long they waited to buy Eras tour merchandise in other cities, including Tampa, Florida, last weekend.
During an interview with The New York Times, Shirley Vogler, a nurse in Tampa, said that she got to the stadium at 10pm on Wednesday12 April, the night before Swift’s first concert in the city. However, she still had to camp out on a sidewalk overnight, along with other Swifties, before merchandise officially went on sale at 10am on Thursday 13 April.
In addition to the long lines to get the merchandise, fans have previously expressed concerns about the quality of the items, after many shared their disappointment over the singer’s Eras tour merchandise getting destroyed in the wash.
The alleged design flaw, which appears to be mainly affecting the shirts emblazoned with 10 multi-coloured photos of the singer in her various eras, become a topic of concern on TikTok.
In one video shared by a fan who goes by the username @daphneorta, she urged fellow Swifties not to put the clothes they bought at the Eras tour in the washing machine. She also showed off her own extremely faded T-shirt. “Don’t wash y’all’s Eras merch. Literally wtf,” she wrote in the caption.
