Inside The Superfan Economy With Fave

From Audience to Economic Force

A superfan is a highly engaged supporter who is willing to spend disproportionately more—financially and emotionally—on a creator because they derive personal value, identity, or connection from that relationship, according to Li Jin, who authored The Passion Economy and the Future of Work (2020).

The Passion Economy is experiencing significant growth, driven by digital platforms that enable individuals, including superfan creators, to monetize unique skills and passions. According to Axios Media Trends, full-time digital creator jobs in the U.S. jumped from 200,000 in 2020 to 1.5 million in 2024—a 7.5-fold increase. Unlike the gig economy, which centers on commoditized tasks, this emerging model prioritizes individuality and creativity—offering creators scalable income without proportional increases in labor. Superfan creators are central to this shift, cultivating deep, direct relationships with niche audiences.

You can see this shift reflected in the types of artists seeing growth in the music industry—and, subsequently, who is behind that growth. According to Luminate’s 2024 Midyear Music Report, over 34,000 artists earned 1–50 million streams—up 5% year-over-year—with 62% distributed independently, inpart reflecting the rise of niche, self-managed groups of fans and superfans.

Superfan Roles: Buyers and Creators

The concept of a superfan can be broken down into two critically important personas: the superfan buyer and the superfan creator. The superfan buyer will spend, on average, $1,000 per year across all artist-generated revenue streams and spend 80% more on music than the average fan. If you have 100 loyal superfan buyers, you are making a decent living. A superfan creator is a passionate fan who earns income by creating and selling fan-driven experiences, products, and content.

The Power of Superfan Communities

A 2025 MIDiA Research study highlighted how superfans play a pivotal role in setting trends and driving community engagement. “The level of influence that a superfan has on the rest of the community is beyond any other kind of consumer-to-consumer influence we’ve seen,” says Jacquelle Horton, founder of fan-to-fan marketplace Fave.
In 2020, the BTS ARMY—the self-titled superfan group of the Korean pop boy band—came together and raised $1 million, matching a donation made by the Black Lives Matter group. This highlights the self-driven nature, power, and influence of superfans when in community.

According to Horton, fans who engage with their community on Fave have shown they are seven times more likely to make a purchase—whether it’s attending an second or third concert, buying merchandise inspired by other fans, or hosting fan-led events. According to Horton, superfan communities create a surplus of demand and willingness to create, which remains largely untapped.

Horton’s Journey to Fave

When Jacquelle Horton was 12, she was an Eminem superfan creator. She designed her own Eminem backpack using white-out, created Eminem posters to hang on her walls, and built Eminem quizzes that she handed out to her friends to test her knowledge.
From building BET’s 106 & Park app—which allowed artists and fans to engage in real time—to leading creator growth, analytics, and automated AI tools on YouTube’s Product team, Horton transformed her understanding of what it meant to be a superfan into a fan-to-fan marketplace called Fave.

“We take what used to be described to us as ‘chaos’—unofficial merch, unofficial meetups, fan accounts—and turn it into an engine that drives deeper loyalty, repeat engagement, and long-tail monetization.”

What is Fave

Fave empowers superfan creators to build sustainable income by allowing fans to build, host, create, and sell products and events on their platform. On the platform, music rights holders can participate in revenues, gain valuable fan insights through FanFinder, and partner with superfan creators on artist campaigns.

Their Fund-a-Fan program lets fans and artists contribute to a shared fund, pitch ideas and vote based on reputation—facilitating fan-backed projects. Similar to Amazon Prime’s ratings and customer reviews, Fave’s fan verification and point system ensures the quality of goods and services.

As the Fave team explains, similar to Roblox and YouTube, Fave provides the infrastructure for fandoms to build their own worlds—scalable, emotion-driven, and poised to unlock a tremendous amount of value.

Fave’s fan-driven campaigns and industry-fan campaigns illustrate the ways in which this value can be unlocked. As well as the impact fans in community can have on growing sustainable careers for artists—and themselves.

Ed Sheeran Superfan Events & Atlantic Records

To mark the 10th anniversary of Ed Sheeran’s X album, Atlantic Records partnered with superfans via Fave to execute nine simultaneous events in cities like Paris, Manila, Rio, and Munich. Superfan creators brought events to life from start to finish—pitching ideas, coordinating venues, crafting merch, filming promos, designing custom menus, leading tribute shows, giveaways, and more fan influencer activations. “The empowerment and global inclusivity that fans experienced changed lives,” said Horton, noting the events reported 99% satisfaction rate.

The creators’ organic social posts reached over 273,000 fan accounts saving the label additional promotional costs. After the event, several fan-led initiatives sprung up as a result, including coordinated tour footage, album cover tributes, and themed events.

K-Pop Fan Conferences

On Fave, BTS and ATEEZ superfan creators organized two independently led fan conferences to celebrate the K-Pop groups’ history. According to Horton, “the conference illustrated the ingenuity of fandom, featuring cover performances, art booths, and dance workshops—while empowering fans celebrate their shared passion.”
Its success sparked a series of similar fan-run events from bar takeovers to theater rentals—demonstrating the scalable nature of fan-powered programming among micro-communities. The average revenue superfan creators make from fan-led conferences is $15,000+. This represents a real opportunity for music rights holders to participate in these organically led events.

Fan Fest

On Fave, superfan creators initiated an international event across Los Angeles and London—celebrating icons in pop, drawing over 430 fans in attendance. The event featured red carpet photo ops, fan Q&As, and a fan art showcase. The superfan creator who hosted the event generated over $20k in fan-to-fan transactions.
Superfan creators reached 42,000+ accounts organically, driving a 41% ticket conversion. With 16,000+ likes and 78,000 impressions, it reignited fandom during an off-cycle period.

The Infrastructure Gap

According to Horton, “fans have been forced to work in a very gray area of fair use, derivative works, and transformative works for a long time.” The legal requirement for name and likeness licenses to produce certain events and products is, in large part, what prevents superfan creators from building legally sustainable businesses around their fandom—without fear of being shut down. That makes sense, as the industry has traditionally lacked the infrastructure needed to participate in this secondary revenue stream and as a result has seldomly viewed it as one.
According to Horton, “Fave is working to solve this challenge and save teams time by streamlining this process, partnering with vetted fan creators, real ROI, and valuable fan data—without requiring hands-on management.”

The growth of the passion economy, however—spearheaded by superfans—continues to grow regardless of industry mentality. In 2023, Goldman Sachs’ Music in the Air report noted that superfans contribute $4.2 billion to the music industry. However, this number solely reflects superfans’ contribution to digital recording revenue. It does not include fan-initiated revenues.

As the future of work continues to drastically evolve over the coming years, it’s critical for the music industry to relinquish some control—as long as they can automatically participate in the upside.