Beyoncé’s spectacular performance at Coachella last weekend cemented her position as one of the world’s greatest performers, but her most recent move has confirmed her as one of the greatest businesspeople of all time, too. One of the hallmarks of her HBCU-inspired performance was the sorority logo emblazoned on the yellow cropped sweatshirt she wore for part of her set (it was also on some other garments she and her backup dancers wore). Today, the singer announced a Beychella Pop-Up Store on her website selling all kinds of merch with the same Beyoncé sorority logo.
The store includes coach jackets, sweatshirts, t-shirts, and even basketball shorts all sharing the same HBCU sorority motif. The items range in price from $115 to $40. At the time of writing, the store will only be up for another 32 days, 9 hours, and just over 30 minutes—I know this thanks to the handy (if stress-inducing) countdown clock at the top of the page, yet another genius business move to get the people busting out the plastic. "Black Bill Gates in the making" indeed.
The timing of the pop-up shop is strategic, too. It comes just six days after Beyoncés first headlining performance at Coachella on Saturday, when she became the first black woman ever to headline the California music festival. She called this fact out both deliberately during her performance and figuratively with the HBCU theme of the universally well-received two-hour long set.
However, the store has also opened just one day before Beyoncé’s second Coachella set, which is set to happen tomorrow night. Coachella customarily has the same performers on the same days spread out over two weekends, but Beyoncé is not a customary performer. There are already reports that her second performance will be different from her first to maintain the “wow” factor.
Needless to say, you should run to the pop-up store if you want to get your hands on some Beychella merch because they’ll probably run out like Lemonade on a hot day.
