By Stephanie Petit for PEOPLE

A run-of-the-mill Target run turned into a surprise meet and greet with Taylor Swift for Nashville residents on Tuesday night. The 27-year-old singer ventured out on her traditional trip to purchase her new album, "reputation", documenting the action on her Instagram story.

“We always have this tradition of going to Target to go buy the album, and so we’re gonna go do that,” she announced while sitting next to her cat at home.

Once at the store, Swift headed straight to the "reputation" display, but it wasn’t long before she was noticed by fans. The pop star stopped to take photos with fans and sign copies of her new album, which dropped last Friday, and she even found some past connections with her admirers — one showed her a photo from their meeting years ago before they both squealed, “We were babies!” while another shared that his band performed a Swift cover for their audition on "X Factor".

Swift also documented just how unexpected the chance encounter came to shoppers.

“I live across the street and just came to get this for dinner,” said one man holding a jar of spaghetti sauce. “And that happened."

The singer also took the time to thank Target employees for sticking it out through the busy album release.

Eyewitness Chandler Turner told Entertainment Tonight that it all went down around 6:30 p.m. local time, and it appeared that Swift made the Target run with her backup singers and dancers. He said Swift was completely accommodating to her large group of gathered fans, sharing she “took photos with every single fan, young and old.”

“It also stood out to me when she said it was a tradition to come to that Target and buy her album,” Turner explained. He added, “Old Taylor is very much not dead.”

Source: PEOPLE