When Alexia French first got the email from Chats and Reacts, the channel run by two of her favorite creators, it was her birthday, and she couldn’t believe what she was reading. Australia-based Taylor Swift superfans Bonny Rebecca and Emily Hunt, the duo behind the popular podcast and YouTube channel, would be coming to New York. And she was on the VIP list.
“I didn’t get to go to the Eras tour. It’s nice to be able to come to an event that elevates girlhood broadly in the same way,” French, who’s been following the creators since 2022, told TheWrap.
One fan, who asked not to be named, put it more bluntly: “It was almost like meeting Taylor Swift.”
That’s not an exaggeration. The event, which was sponsored by Patreon and reserved for members of the Chats and Reacts Patreon, took place in Maxwell Social, a Tribeca event space adorned with books and comfy yet stylish furniture that wouldn’t look out of place in a Taylor Swift music video. It was a setting that felt natural for a pair of creators who got their start by obsessively and lovingly dissecting Swift’s work on camera. Within an hour of my arrival, a fan in a flowery dress asked me to take a friendship bracelet she had made, declaring that whatever song title that appeared on the bracelet was a reflection of my love life. (I got “Miss Americana & the Heartbreak Prince,” for what it’s worth.)
One VIP attendee had traveled all the way from Ohio for the panel. Still another excitedly DMed me a guide to the Chats and Reacts channel she had made after she learned how much of a novice I was.
“In a lot of ways, [the event] almost reinforces what we already do and what our approach is. Getting feedback from people face-to-face is just so beautiful and so fulfilling,” Hunt told TheWrap.
The exclusive gathering is the latest example of the growing trend of creators putting on more live events — a trend that coincides with increased interest in IRL events overall. Live events can provide new revenue streams for creators and, as Hunt and Rebecca have experienced, strengthen fan devotion. That’s why companies like Patreon and Live Nation have become more invested in partnering with creators on these opportunities.
More often than not, creators and fans alike have been embracing this approach because it gives them access to something that can’t easily be quantified: a sense of community. And as the creator ecosystem evolves, the strengthened relationship between creators and their fans is becoming more important than ever. Gen Z women in particular are far more eager for real-life events, with 49% saying they prefer real-world events compared to digital ones, according to an NRG study published in collaboration with TheWrap. And when it comes to creators, those fans show up.
Salish Matter’s launch of the skincare line Sincerely Yours was so popular that New Jersey’s American Dream Mall had to be shut down after more than 80,000 people came out for the event. Three of Hannah Berner and Paige DeSorbo’s “Giggly Shows” in Madison Square Garden sold out in under an hour, prompting the podcasters to add a fourth show.
“When we think about creators doing larger live events, a lot of it comes down to conversion. There are a lot of times where creators will have huge followings on social media and a lot of likes, but that doesn’t automatically make [the audience] hard ticket buyers,” Alexis Fisher, the co-founder of Live Nation’s newly created vertical Creator Nation, told TheWrap.
“A lot of times a good reference point would be: Have they ever sold merch? Have they ever sold a product? Have they ever hosted a meet and greet? Seeing the fans come off screen into real life is a really great indicator of someone who should tour and potentially look at moving into a hard ticket model.”
Some creators have already started to more regularly incorporate live events into their regular workflows. Dude Perfect’s second tour — “Squad Games” — grossed $11.4 million in ticket sales this year. Kareem Rahma had a run of “SubwayTakes Live!” shows in Brooklyn this fall, and the creator-focused comedy collective Dropout has hosted live shows since 2025. That’s without touching on the world of podcasting. Tony Hinchcliffe’s “Kill Tony,” Ashley Flowers’ “Crime Junkie” and Joe Santagato and Frank Alvarez’s “The Basement Yard” have all had successful live tours, just to mention a handful of the dozens of successful podcasts that have embraced this strategy.
Then there’s “Anazala Family Live,” the first live event from the popular family-focused YouTube channel, which sold out Newark’s Prudential Center in just 25 minutes. It had always been Anas Marwah’s dream to appear onstage, and his wife Asala Maleh had wanted to face her fears of singing in front of a massive live audience. After receiving some advice from Kevin Hart at a Spotter conference for creators, Marwah and Maleh decided to make that dream a reality, recruiting professionals who had worked on everything from the Super Bowl halftime show to Bad Bunny’s Puerto Rico residency to make the best live show, which included a concert and a live version of their channel, they possibly could. Part of that commitment to craft was to prove that YouTubers can make a show as compelling as more traditional stars.
“We took it upon ourselves to make sure that it was not bad and that it was really up to the highest level of all,” Marwah told TheWrap. Marwah was pleased with the response, calling the whole experience “amazing.”
Patreon’s investment in creator events
Before their August event in New York, Hunt and Rebecca hosted a couple of meet-and-greets for fans. One event took place at a bakery owned by a fan, which was complete with custom-made treats. Though both Chats and Reacts hosts were grateful for that fan’s kindness and described the event as “wholesome,” the event got out of control.
“It was hectic,” Hunt said. “We were there for seven hours. We only meant to be there for three. We couldn’t leave. There were too many people for the whole bakery.”
So when Patreon, the platform the duo use the most, mentioned the possibility of collaborating on an event, they were all ears. The company has been helping creators with live events since 2024 and this year, it expects to host 18 creator-fan events, a 64% increase from a year ago. These events can range from meet-ups and panels, like the one Hunt and Rebecca hosted, to mini conventions that bring together several creators who are all part of the same niche community.
“We plan [these events] against the creators’ business needs and wants,” Mike McGarry, chief marketing officer for Patreon, told TheWrap. That could mean offering an exclusive event as a motivator to encourage a fan to be part of a higher-cost tier for a channel. “It’s a little bit about growing the fandom for them, but also deepening those meaningful connections as well. Your ride or dies are showing up, becoming even closer to you and — probably on the platform — sharing more love and getting more people exposed to that creator.”
Investing in these sorts of events is a relatively new venture for Patreon. The platform specifically identities creators who are part of niche subcultures that have the ability to scale. Fashion is an emerging sector for this offering thanks in part to the success of Recho Omondi’s “The Cutting Room Floor,” but creators who specialize in tabletop RPGs, the Bravo universe and the maker community — a word used to describe DIY enthusiasts — are all ideal for live events, Patreon has found.
“It’s actually an interesting model because we are only incentivized by creators making money, so it’s not like we’re not trying to plug in other things to the ecosystem,” McGarry said. “These subcultures have tremendous scale, and that’s where we’ve found our sweet spot from a business perspective but also from a community perspective.”
These events can also be creatively energizing to creators, professionals who often work alone or on small teams. Events that bring together several similar creators allow them to talk shop, and even the fan-focused events can go a long way in reminding creators that their follower counts are more than just a number.
“I think that we should consider doing events more often or even doing them ourselves,” Hunt said. “When you’re working behind the camera constantly, it’s like, ‘Are there really people there?’ It’s a really good reminder for us of what we’re doing and what that purpose is: making people feel connected and seen in all sorts of ways.”
The realization of a dream
When Marwah and Maleh first started posting on YouTube, they tried to emulate the MrBeast-inspired over-the-top videos, but that approach never felt right to them. Instead, they made it their mission to bring 2010s-style day-in-the-life vlogs back to YouTube. That focus was incorporated into their live show, which was part concert, part bringing their YouTube vlog to life.
“That was the big question for us. Is it ready? Is YouTube-come-to-life something that makes people go crazy? And how good is Asala? She’s a creator first, so how good is she going to be singing in front of 15,000 people in the arena?” Marwah said. Repeatedly, Marwah and Maleh asked companies and venues to give them a shot and let them test out their concept, but only Live Nation backed their vision.
That’s not entirely surprising given that Live Nation launched a new vertical designed to support creators across content, commerce, brand partnerships and live experiences. Creator Nation was announced earlier this month and is led by co-founders Scott and Alexis Fisher, who founded Select Management Group and Timeline Management, respectively. The venture was specifically designed to support creators who may not understand the complexities of hosting a fan-focused event.
“If you don’t have a touring agent or a music agent or you don’t know how to produce a show, it’s really challenging,” Fisher said. “What we’re doing at Creator Nation is essentially providing the resources to the talent to take the lift off of them to be able to compete with traditional music artists.”
Part of the reason why Fisher is so invested in creator-focused companies like Timeline and now Creator Nation is because she’s seen firsthand how passionate these audiences are. That’s the sort of magic she hopes to help facilitate in the creator ecosystem.
“When YouTubers first started, there were lines wrapped around malls and frenzies that were happening with these creators because it wasn’t so overly saturated,” Fisher said. “It’s nice to get back to that model and take the communities from just living on a platform to in real life.”
As for Marwah and Maleh, they see their live show as the first test in a new era of their channel. “From our perspective, it’s definitely a trial phase. At the end of the day, if you’re gonna make big profits out of this, you want to really take it on tour,” Marwah said. Whether that means an actual tour, an annual show or a livestreamed special remains to be seen.
Live as a way to experiment
Rahma knew for a while that he wanted to find a way to turn “SubwayTakes” into a live show. Part of the charm of his shortform series comes from the fact it takes place on New York’s MTA, a filming location that can be disrupted at any time by bustling commuters or good old fashioned NYC weirdos.
“The show has changed quite a bit from the first show. I’ve been developing it for like probably a year now,” Rahma told TheWrap back in June. “Now it’s at a place where the whole show is audience engagement.”
“SubwayTakes Live” places Rahma onstage with a collection of comedians and creators. Before the show, audiences are asked to submit their hot take. Rahma then calls selected audience members onstage to present and ultimately defend their takes, no matter how deranged they may be. Rather than requiring absolute silence from the audience, Rahma lets his audience emote, encouraging applause, boos and even the occasional outburst. It’s a relaxed atmosphere that tonally matches his shortform show; about halfway through the event I was lightly arguing with the stranger next to me about bike lanes.
“I do like the idea of being able to have another piece of content, aka the edited live show, that can then exist somewhere else where people can tune into it,” Rahma said.
