Taylor Swift”s “Red” is on target to sell at least 1 million in its first week of release. She reached the half-way mark yesterday, on “Red”s” first day of release, according to Billboard.
Aiding in getting her to the 500,000 tally was a record opening day at Target, which is exclusively selling a deluxe edition of “Red” with three extra songs. The mass merchant sold more than 160,000 copies.
In addition to moving physical CDs, Swift is also leading sales on iTunes Music Store, where Billboard cites Swift sold 250,000 album downloads on Monday. In addition to having the top-selling album on the music site, Swift has 10 songs in the top 20 of iTunes Top Songs tally.
Should “Red” surpass the million mark, it will be Swift”s second consecutive title, following 2010″s “Speak Now,” to do so and will make Swift the only woman to achieve the feat since the debut of SoundScan in 1991.
The last album to sell more than one million copies in its opening week was Lady Gaga”s “Born This Way.” However, that included an Amazon MP3 99-cent sale.
Swift’s label, Big Machine, has also taken some moves that give “Red” the best possible chance to surpass the million mark: The album is not available on any streaming services, including Spotify or Rdio. Plus, iTunes is the only digital retailer selling the album, which means neither Amazon nor Best Buy could sell downloads as loss leaders (following Lady Gaga’s move, Billboard will not count albums sold for less than $3.49 in their first few weeks of release).