How much is Travis Scott worth?
As of Q4 2020
Backstory
Jacques Berman Webster II was born in Houston, Texas and was raised by his Grandmother when he was young in a south-central Houston neighborhood. The area was notorious for crime and had an impact on a young Webster who has said “I was always like, ‘I gotta get the f*ck out this sh*t.' It gave me my edge and it made me who I am today.” – Wiki.
He then moved to to Missouri City, a middle-class suburban area bordering southwest Houston, to live with his parents. His mother worked for Apple and his father ran his own business. Webster graduated high school and attended college for a year before dropping out his sophomore year to fully pursue his music career.
Early Rap Career
In 2008 Webster formed a duo group known as The Graduates with his longtime friend Chris Holloway, the duo released their untitled first EP on the social networking website, Myspace.
Webster then moved from Houston to New York City to begin working with friend Mike Waxx, who owned the music website Illroots. After moving to New York, Scott slept on the floor at his friend's house and spent most of his time at Just Blaze's studio. Eventually frustrated in New York and the lack of progression, he moved to Los Angeles, California, after only four months in NY.
In Los Angeles, Webster was abandoned by his friend who had promised to provide housing. His parents cut him off financially and he eventually was forced to relocate back to Houston, where his parents kicked him out of their home. Webster moved back to Los Angeles once again and began to sleep on the couch of a friend who studied at University of Southern California.
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In 2012, Atlanta-based rapper and owner of Grand Hustle Records, T.I. would later hear one of Webster's productions, titled “Lights (Love Sick)“. While in Los Angeles, T.I.'s representative contacted Webster, asking him to come down to a studio. T.I. then freestyled a verse over for Webster's produced song “Animal”. He then acquired the phone number of Kanye West's engineer, Mike Dean, that lead to organizing a meeting which allowed him to play his music for Kanye. Webster then worked with Kanye and Dean on his debut project, Owl Pharaoh, becoming Travi$ Scott. On March 27, 2013 XXL revealed that Scott was a member of their Freshman Class of 2013 due to the success of his debut project.
Today
Fast forward to today, Travis Scott has released multiple albums, been nominated for seven Grammy's, has had multiple songs featured in the Billboard Hot 100, started his own music label, had a baby girl with 900 million estimated NET worth, Kylie Jenner, and signed deals with Nike, Playstation, Fortnite, and McDonalds. (among others)
Music / Cactus Jack
After his early success in his Music career Travis signed deals with Kanye's GOOD Music, Epic Records, and Grand Hustle.
In March 2017, Scott announced he would be launching his own music label, under the name of Cactus Jack Records. During an interview about his new label, Scott said, “I'm not doing it to have financial control over my music. I want first and foremost to help other artists, launch new names, to provide opportunities. I want to do for them what happened to me, but better.”
Cactus jack is one of the best new music labels for artists today. The label's first compilation album titled ‘JackBoys', was released in 2019 and the compilation album charted at number 1 in 2020 on the Billboard 200. The label also has its own publishing division, Cactus Jack Publishing.
Music/Label: $50 million+
Nike
Scott is also known for his many collaborations with top sports brand, Nike. The most important element to Scott's storm is the lineup of sneakers he's been allowed to remix to fit his own representative style. In a GQ interview with Yu-Ming Wu, Stadium Goods' (The world's premier marketplace for authentic sneakers and streetwear) chief marketing officer gave interesting insights to Scott's sneaker success.
“A lot of rappers and entertainers like to think of themselves as sneakerheads, but Travis Scott is a rare breed with a deep appreciation of the culture,” says Wu. “He often brings back older, hyped sneakers which helps educate new heads and remind the old heads. His love and respect for the industry is a big part of his sneaker cult following.” Accordingly, Scott has redesigned some of the most iconic shoes in Nike's history: the Air Force 1, the Jordan 1, the Jordan 4, the Jordan 6, and now the Dunk.
Scott's shoes and merch have done so well that Stadium Goods brought a pop-up dedicated to the rapper to Fred Segal in Los Angeles. But the qualities that separate Scott from other collaborators are often described in vague terms. “This design language, his love for sneakers, his fashion choice and his character are what makes his sneakers special,” says Wu. Scott's success in sneakers may be explained by the same quality that makes his music so popular: he's a master synthesizer.
According to SneakerFreaker, Regarding his Nike deal, he ‘probably' makes about $10 million a year, but considering his exploits with the Swoosh have led to so many opportunities with other brands as well as his own, that figure seems to be a little low.
Nike collab: (At least) $25 million
McDonalds
Scott also partnered up with McDonald's in 2020 to create the US$6 Travis Scott meal, released on September 8 and around the same time, released Cactus Jack merchandise inspired by McDonald's. Travis made an Estimated $20 Million from His McDonald's Meal Deal. The rapper was the first celebrity to get his own meal since Michael Jordan in 1992.
McDonalds meal/merch: $20 million+
Fortnite
In April 2020, Scott hosted a series of free virtual concerts on the popular video game Fortnite. More than 27 million fans tuned in and the three-day event led to a massive boost in Cactus Jack merchandise sales, Forbes reported.
The first concert on Fortnite happened way back in February 2019, when a total of 10.7 million viewers attended the event, breaking all prior records of attendance in Fortnite events. The Travis Scott concert proved to be even more successful, and led to the speculation of making Fortnite concerts “Pay to attend”.
Fortnite partnership: Estimated +$5 million
Playstation
With the release of the new Playstation 5 this year Travis began to tease a collaboration on his social media. Playstation then announced that because Travis Scott is such a huge fan of Playstation, they wanted to bring him on as a “strategic creative partner.” Playstation added, “We heard Travis is a huge PlayStation fan, so we started a conversation with him that led to this unique partnership,” the blog post reads. “Through our mutual passion for gaming and creativity, we plan on collaborating with Travis and his Cactus Jack brand to produce innovative projects that we hope will delight our collective fans.”
Travis also shared his excitement, “I'm really looking forward to being able to showcase everything that Cactus Jack has worked on with Sony and the PlayStation team. Most importantly I'm excited to see how the PlayStation fans and family respond, and I look forward to running some games with everybody very soon!”
As Travis has been a leading advertiser for the playstation 5 this year, it also sounds like some Cactus jack themed games or Playstation style shoes are in the works.
Playstation deal: $1 million (estimated $25+ million over multiyear deal)
Recap
With that kind of marketing success under Travis' belt, plenty of companies are going to continue to keep calling.
Jacques Berman Webster II, coming from a poor crime ridden South-central Houston neighborhood is estimated to make more than $100 million this year based on the partnerships and deals mentioned in this article. However, some financial magazines have Scott's estimated 2020 earnings reportedly pushing into nine-figure territory as some of the details of all these deals mean for his merch, music sales and also social media interactions.
The sky is truly the limit for La Flame, the 28 year old Houston based rapper who feels as if he's barely scratched the surface.
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Read: Travis Scott Announces a Creative Partnership With PlayStation
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