I was deliberately being quite broad brush otherwise you have to go down too many rabbit holes. But I agree absolutely with what you are saying. Some of these costs are examples form actual touring budgets and others are slightly hand-wavy.
Quite likely an artist of this scale would not even break even touring and would hope (ha!) to make up the difference on merch. But of course merchandise is not pure profit, you have to lug it around on the road, and it’s a sunk cost that requires upfront investment.
But my main point was to counter the fallacy that artists make loads of money from touring. People with no experience of the music industry don’t understand the promoter/artist split or the agent and magnet commissions. They realise that probably the artist isn’t getting 100% of the ticket sales but they don’t realise that their share - before their costs - might only be 35-40%.
Quite likely an artist of this scale would not even break even touring and would hope (ha!) to make up the difference on merch. But of course merchandise is not pure profit, you have to lug it around on the road, and it’s a sunk cost that requires upfront investment.
But my main point was to counter the fallacy that artists make loads of money from touring. People with no experience of the music industry don’t understand the promoter/artist split or the agent and magnet commissions. They realise that probably the artist isn’t getting 100% of the ticket sales but they don’t realise that their share - before their costs - might only be 35-40%.