Taylor Swift's 'Red' Scores Biggest Sales Week for an Album Since 2002
Credit: Kevin Mazur/WireImage/Getty Images.
Taylor Swift's punishing promotional schedule for her album "Red," which saw her performing on nearly every TV show you can think of, paid off in a big way: the album's set a sales record.
"Red" sold more than 1.2 million copies its first week in stores, according to Billboard and Nielsen SoundScan. That's more than any album has sold in a single week since 2002, when Eminem sold 1.3 million copies of his album "The Eminem Show." With those sales, it's no surprise that "Red" also debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard album chart. It's Swift's third chart-topper.
Another huge achievement for the 22-year-old singer is that she's now the only woman ever to have two million-selling weeks since SoundScan started tracking album sales in 1991. Her last album, 2010's "Speak Now," sold 1.047 million copies in its first week.
"Red" is the 18th album ever to sell a million or more copies in a week in the SoundScan era.