It was a weekend to remember for Taylor Swift fans and Lower Mainland retailers.

Over three nights, BC Place hosted 160,000 fans for the final dates of Swift’s record-breaking Eras Tour.

Over the three days and many days before, Taylor-style events and menus dominated Vancouver.

“The atmosphere was electric,” Braden Matthews of Earls Kitchen + Bar told Global News.

“I don’t think I was a Swifty until this weekend. But I found myself singing along to every song. And then the waiting list got pretty long. But we actually opened up the upstairs for waiting Swifties, which is normally an event space… We livestreamed the concert up there. It was such a mood.

“It was by far the busiest since the Olympics.”

Shop owners told Global News that stores were busy.

“They wanted to spend money too,” said Sean Mcgarva, owner of West of Woodward.

“For many Americans, the dollar was an important factor. Those were the biggest donors…the Americans.”

With global ticket sales of more than $2 billion, the Eras Tour is the highest-grossing tour of all time.

It is estimated that the economic impact on BC was approximately $160 million.

“Just numbers we’ve never seen before,” said Rohaan Sethna of Destination Vancouver.

“The tour generated approximately 82,000 hotel room nights. Over 160,000 visitors at three different trade shows, so it’s really breathtaking to see the impact on the (economy) for sure.”

Sethna said they estimate about 70 per cent of participants are from outside Vancouver.

“It’s great to see this visit and it’s great that there were so many fantastic things for Taylor Swift fans to do.”

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While there were some initial safety concerns, Vancouver police, which had more than 700 officers stationed downtown, said there was no bad blood over the weekend.

“Now that the weekend is over, from a public safety perspective, we’re just thrilled with how positive it was and how safe it was,” said Sgt. Steve Addison of the Vancouver Police Department.

“We had a number of children separated from their parents and our officers were there to assist in reuniting those children with their parents.”

In a statement, Rogers Communications said Swift fans on the Rogers 5G network used over 11 terabytes (TB) of mobile data in just a few hours at BC Place, breaking the previous record at their concert in Toronto on November 21, when the Fans used 7.4 terabytes (TB) of TB of data on the Rogers 5G network.

The communications company said fans used enough data on a single show to stream Taylor’s entire music catalog 9,450 times.

The data used on December 8 represents 307,000 photo uploads and 2,180 hours of video streaming, according to the statement. Based on data usage spikes, the most shared moments from the show were Taylor Swift’s appearance on stage and the start of the “Reputation” era.

&Copy 2024 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.