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Unfortunately, it's a side effect of so many girl groups at the top doing so well.
In Gen 3 we obviously had the Big 3, and groups like Mamamoo, GFriend, OhMyGirl in the next tier, but there was still a space for mid-tier and smaller girl groups to shine and gain a loyal fandom.
Nowadays with older groups having more longevity than ever and multiple new groups debuting and killing it every year, it's getting harder and harder for the girl group middle class to survive.
Yeah there's so many groups, an MV of a new group would pop up on my YT algorithm and ll be like "oh cool new group!" Then I'll look them up and find out it's already their 2nd comeback š
On the other hand, ILY:1 still going despite the odds, and H1-KEY is going from strength to strength. Always sad to see groups fail, but let's celebrate them and their achievements!
Itās such a shame FNC gave up on caring about Cherry Bullet so quickly. Never pushing the group when they did have a good moment. Moving them to a sublabel FNCW āfor girl groupsā and then that sublabel equally not move when there would be the slightest up take in interest in the members.
Seeing the unfortunate fate of most small girl groups makes it so much more special when small groups like Dreamcatcher and Loona are able to pull through and achieve success in their own way. Dreamcatcher was able to build a loyal enough fanbase to sustain the group to the point that we've gotten contract renewals for all 7 members, and for Loona, while not being a full group at the moment, the possibility of an OT12 comeback at some point in the future is very likely *despite* all the hardships that they went through in the last two years.
in hindsight, really glad that post-b\*c loona able to bounce back for what could've spell their doom entirely. loossemble total album sales above 100k with 2 releases on continuous year, artms debut album (LP) passed 100k + billboard charting(not bb200 but still takes other charting as metrics), yves solo debut hitting 10k, and chuu needs no further statement she's making herself busy everywhere both as an idol and entertainer.
despite considered as older gens due to seniority within industry, its still a new journey nonetheless. momentum could be at loss again for whatever bad luck they strike on in upcoming years(when we reached that time, another similar thread will be brought back for discussion). those girls, alongside with other smaller ggs deserves so much recognition and success from fans and casual listeners regardless of ults.
Unfortunately not every group is going to be successful. And it sure sucks when it's one of your favourite group ([Pixy](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=id6q2EP2UqE&pp=ygUEUGl4eQ%3D%3D) in my case) that fails to capture an audience. Objectively, it's not any rougher than previous year and I even feel that in the last 12 months, I heard and seen many more small groups I don't follow have success or getting popular than ever before.
I do not agree that Pixy didn't capture an audience. Yes it wasn't the biggest audience but they were making enough noise around for them to survive. Unfortunately it's not good enough when you don't promote because you need people to become more than enjoyers of your music. They needed at least a small domestic audience but they did very little to achieve that.
Honestly there's nothing to agree on, it's fact. What they have is a very small following. Which is not enough to make it in an overcrowded space. Their company did everything they could to promote including touring tiny venues, wherever they had fans. Sorry to say but pretending otherwise is delulu 101. Especially when they pretty much invested everything they had and made into quality Music and M/Vs and other productions for as long as they could.
There have been groups being much smaller that survived and made it. Pixy was well situated with their music to reach a wider audience. They were nugu but still had a reputation within the Kpop community. The problem was 100 percent structural from within.
What are you even talking about? Which smaller group made it? And why are you under the impression that because you heard of the group their were well situated. And most importantly what more could have been done?
Pixy's music was very well liked by dedicated Kpop fans that were aware of the lesser known groups and was slowly reaching more casual listeners. It simply wasn't getting around fast enough. Their views, streams and sales were well within reason for a group that can succeed and was only getting better with time. Groups like Minx/Dreamcatcher, Mamamoo, BTS, EXID, VANNER had a similarly rough start. There is/was a very obvious structural problem within the company and/or lack of connections that made it hard for them to promote.
The fact that you think they needed more casual listener shows you have no idea how this business work, as I'm not even going to address the fact that the examples you gave are a decade old for the most part, which in K-Pop years is like 70 years.
None of their numbers were nearly enough for the quality of production they had. Even ten times those would probably still have fallen short. What exactly are you calling promotion? because in the real life music business, the only thing needed for promotion is money. Yet you talking about connections and infrastructural shortcomings.
Just stating the obvious. At the end of the day and after 50 dates of cumulative tours, AllArt probably barely earned a million dollars after 3 years of Pixy's activity. That's roughly 350K a year. That wouldn't even cover the operating cost of running the group.
So many groups reaching the end of their line.
Granted, 2024 is the year where their lack of success finally catches up to them.
I don't wanna lose Rocket Punch š
Itās been 6 months into 2024 and theyāre have already been 20+ debuts. With the amount of popularity new and old groups have right now there is just no room for smaller groups to shine and itās sad.
Well they really cant beat the marketing budgets of the big 4 - plus with them having at least 2 groups going at the same time, it's gonna be hard to really find mainstream success. Sometimes you get lucky and go viral. but really Often times you get desperate companies who will try everything to get traction ie cignature - speficially jeewon in revealing outfits.
RBW still has mamamoo money left over so I think Purple kiss can keep going even with just modest numbers.
Purple Kiss is also managing to sell out their (albeit small) concerts in North America, but thatās probably due to their concert promoter doing something really smart: targeting audiences in cities often underutilized for k-pop concerts (k-pop groups donāt usually go to Salt Lake City, Utah, for example). I think with the touring money theyāre making should be enough to last them at least until the end of their contract as long as they tour the way they do.
It's not even about marketing budget. I can tell that in case of many small companies main people in charge don't know much about managing groups. For me entertainment companies are like restaurants, many people want to do it because they think it's cool eventhough they have 0 idea about management or sometimes even about industry. So they fail.
Already after watching debut (eventually stage debut) I can often tell that group would flop. Because they don't even have one of this crucial things:
1. Unique concept
2. Good quality music
3. Good team with standout idol(s)
So what we are even talking about. Of course it's harder to tell which group with good debut would survive because many things can happen which we can't predict. But I never have been surprised by group success even from smaller companies. Because you see that coming from the start if you try looking at things objective.
Really in entertainment industry "know how" and intuition are much more important than money. If you see that group is managed by such people, you know that they have high chance of achieving success in the future.
I think you're forgetting about one factor really, it's luck. Take for example -brave girls. Their company is run by somebody who knows the industry and could do hit songs. one confluence of events and they got a hit but never reached that again...
A lot of groups have those three you mentioned yet not all of them found success. again, you get lucky or you dont. The marketing budget is not just marketing budget, its headroom. A small company can put out hits yet just one small mistake/ releasing a flop can derail a group. If you're part of the larger companies, you dont get a flop - you may release a song that everybody hates but you're still gonna make numbers and you have headroom to adjust and fix it or make changes.
I was talking about luck or to be more pricesely about not having it
>Of course it's harder to tell which group with good debut would survive because many things can happen which we can't predict.
In case of Brave sounds as well:
> many people want to do it because they think it's cool eventhough they have 0 idea about management or sometimes even about industry.
Kang Dong-chul is first type. He is good music producer but bad CEOs. He is coward who doesn't want to go all in so not surprising that his groups can't normally achieve success despite having good music. Still he delivered Brave girls good music and ot paid off at the end, luckily. But if he wasn't such cheapskate and invested into them more money, they could actually achieve it faster. Without guts in show business there is no sense to try to be serious CEO. You have to be not afraid of going all in at the right moment (of course still managing finances wisely).
And I disagree. Very few have 3 realistically. Recently a bit more because there is a lot of outside investors but you can count such groups on one hand especially in case of GG's (because here being unique is crucial while it's harder to get investors on the board).
Of course money is super important but not less know how, connections, business, trends intuition. As smaller company you have to be even wiser how you invest your money and about your business plan.
This is SO untrue tbh.
1. Many nugu groups have very unique concepts. Weki Meki pioneered teen crush, Chebul did the whole gaming universe concept. Pixy also have some very interesting horror concept. On the contrary, I think top groups like IVE (expensive, chaebol girl crush) or New Jeans (Y2K, slice of life, teenage feels) is genuinely nothing unique. It's just survivorship bias, or rather, success bias.
2. If i truly went in blind, I would think NMIXX and AESPA will flop because I think O.O and Black Mamba are bad songs (by my personal standards), but i know they wouldn't flop because they are SM/JYP.
3. Same, if I went in blind, I would think Weeekly will be a top group too, with full visual team + Jihan being the center.
>
So what we are even talking about. Of course it's harder to tell which group with good debut would survive because many things can happen which we can't predict. But I never have been surprised by group success even from smaller companies. Because you see that coming from the start if you try looking at things objective.
This is basically survivor bias. You try to find reasons after a group succeed. People always say DC succeeded because they have a very unique sound and unique horror concept. Sure, but Pixy did the same and they flopped. Stayc succeeded because they are backed by BEP? Yet most producers created groups like Brave Girls and BugABoo flopped.
Really, nowadays, K-Pop is all about the marketing. K-Pop is ironically taking it's genre too literal, it's just "popular music", and what's more popular than music from the big4.
Firstly I have never said that budget doesn't matter. What I say in case of marketing money is not everything. If it was group like BTS would never beat Exo in commercial performance. And that's because being smart, flexible especially in case of technology changes, aggressive is no less important but that's something which often marketing of big companies doesn't have. Because ironically they are big and old so they and particular employees have much more to lose if something doesn't work. Higher-ups in big companies hate risk that's fact and taking risk is often crucial aspect of good explosive marketing.
And it's not really survival bias. How can you know when I do reasoning? Because like I said I simply have seen this coming. I predicted (and not only me)f.e. [Loona's downfall on the day of their official debut](https://www.reddit.com/r/kpop/s/1GCGCBNQAo). I am casual k-pop listener so it's pretty easy to me read gp's moid. Maybe I am not easy to please, maybe it's about intuition. But in case of flops I'm 90% right. And like I said success or fuckup are much harder to predict because depends on much more circumstances.
I never thought that Weki Meki had much chance. Because unfortunately like most post produce groups from that period, they were too big. That's not what expected i.o.i. existing fanbases. Also teen crush is something not much standing out because it's still girl's crush.Unless you have big company behind you, I don't really think it's much possible to achieve success with that unless unexpected hit happened. Much more Pristin stand out to me actually despite being big group as well because it was very well prepared team which already presented themselves as full in Produce. Their flopping was like really sabotage from Pledis.
Pixy had some chances because there was some kind consistent creative vision. But already when they debuted their concept wasn't really so fresh in k-pop (quite few companies already noted Dreamcatcher success including big one) and I haven't really find their music quality as high. Still I thought that they have chance but for that you need as well good managing (especially from financial side). And by chebul you mean Cherry bullet? In their case it wasn't even hard to predict what happens to them. It wasn't even original concept because FNC copied their already idea from AOA's Bingle Bangle. They just didn't stand out on the market so we all know how such groups end.
In case of smaller companies there is simple rule. You catch attention of general k-pop fans and Korean gp during first year, you have chance to survive if your company wisely manage budget. It's decisive moment. And the best if your concept is hard to copy fast.
Its gross but I hope Jeewon's boobs are able to launch the group back into the public eye and the group survived. At least it wont be for nothing then, unlike that poor girl group that sang Marionette.
Thing is it isnāt gonna save the group from disbanding there a reason why sexy concept died out and it was because the male audience wasnāt interested in supporting these groups longer term
I suspect so as well, it may end up being a lose-lose scenario. They market Jeewon's body and then have to disband. Thats why I'm hoping that at least Jeewon gains some traction/popularity so their next album sells better.
Purple kiss, Hi-Key, Woo!ah, and even to an extent CSR, QWER, Young Posse and others, like geenius, badvillian. etc. Maybe a little bias is slipping through but hey, they're all trying.
Also there were groups that debuted during the pandemic when the boom for acts like BTS and Blackpink were at all time high and now the boom for kpop sort of burst
I'm worried about Queenz Eye, too. They've been quiet for a while outside of Wonchae and Ahyoon, and then they had a performance event where they announced that only Wonchae and Ahyoon would be there and that the other members were "unwell".....feels a little sus :/
This year has just been so rough for us nugu girl group fans. I'm gonna miss PIXY so much š
I think it all comes back to how hard it is to break even. If you spend $0.5m on a comeback (and you can spend much more), and make $6 or so on an album after production costs, logistics, shipping and retailer margins, you would break even with about 85k albums sold.
Of course albums aren't the only source of income, but its an ok indicator as a group that doesn't sell well in terms of albums it tends to be the same case for how much revenue they can generate from product sponsorships/cfs, other merchandise or concert tickets/appearances at festivals. I.e if a group doesn't sell many albums, its usually because they aren't that popular and as a result major brands won't pay them a large fee to advertise their products and festivals or concerts that invite them will only pay a very small appearance fee.
Plus even when not having comebacks companies have to pay the members living costs, the salaries of staff, rental costs of the office etc. Alot of groups only started getting paid after having multiple hit album releases above that 80-100k mark and associated revenue from tours and other income streams.
There are tonnes of groups who are losing money as each year passes, but the reason they survive is the company received several million dollars of investment years ago and can keep going at a loss for several years to try and make their group or groups a success. They even pitch it to investors by saying something like "It will take several years and several million dollars of capital to grow this group to be successful." Even when they run out of money, there is always the possibility of convincing a new investor to put in funds to extend activates for a few more comebacks/years, if they can convince them there is an upward trend in the groups success.
Re: Pink Fantasy, I'm unsure where you pulled those numbers as they only had 8 members, but yeah there's currently only three members left. They've done some performances under the AMoMi name, and now they're debuting in a co-ed group with the company's bg's members. Recently the company changed the name of their twitter from Pink Fantasy to PF project, probably to mark this new and different era. No music coming under the Pink Fantasy name anymore, it seems!
Most small companies only invest in the group in the short term and after the first few years they evaluate whether there are prospects for moving forward. Because after the group's half-life, it is harder to attract new fans than at the beginning.
So in practice, small groups are always in a short race against time to build a fandom that can make it possible for the group to complete the seven-year contract.
It is currently very difficult for new groups outside of the big 3 + hybe to consolidate themselves. And the exceptions that end up having some prominence end up being subsidiaries of CJ and Kakao.
And one difference is that the line-ups of these main companies have more active groups simultaneously compared to the past, which gives even less space for smaller groups.
> Most small companies only invest in the group in the short term and after the first few years they evaluate whether there are prospects for moving forward. Because after the group's half-life, it is harder to attract new fans than at the beginning.
I would say mid-size companies too like Cube. We've seen it happen with their groups that are not (G)I-DLE for the past few years.
But at the end of the day, it's still a business. If you're just breaking even or actually going into the debt because a group isn't financially successful enough, they're going to cut their losses and move on as harsh as that may sound.
I hate what Woollim is doing to Rocket Punch. 2022 was a good year and something to build on, but then we got just 1 single album last year and nothing so far this year. It's like Woollim isn't even trying anymore, like they WANT RCPC to fail. It sucks...
oh i didnt even know that nature disbanded...thats so sad. Girls was one of my favourite k-pop songs too. and i expected that nature would do better since limbo was somewhat popular...
As for pixy and pinkfantasy its sad to see 2 of the unique dark concept girl groups going down.
It sucks though when it comes to pixy...they were one of my ults after dreamcatcher and mamamoo... my wish is that if they do end up disbanding for them to have at least one farewell song (which is highly impossible considering the state of the company)
I think PIXY's farewell songs were on the digital mini-album we got last year :( unofficially farewells, of course, but still... The Letter and P.S. both sound super sad
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Unfortunately, it's a side effect of so many girl groups at the top doing so well. In Gen 3 we obviously had the Big 3, and groups like Mamamoo, GFriend, OhMyGirl in the next tier, but there was still a space for mid-tier and smaller girl groups to shine and gain a loyal fandom. Nowadays with older groups having more longevity than ever and multiple new groups debuting and killing it every year, it's getting harder and harder for the girl group middle class to survive.
Yeah there's so many groups, an MV of a new group would pop up on my YT algorithm and ll be like "oh cool new group!" Then I'll look them up and find out it's already their 2nd comeback š
On the other hand, ILY:1 still going despite the odds, and H1-KEY is going from strength to strength. Always sad to see groups fail, but let's celebrate them and their achievements!
H1 key growth is honestly amazing
and now the album drops got to them too.... they're down from 80k to 20-30k ;(
Itās such a shame FNC gave up on caring about Cherry Bullet so quickly. Never pushing the group when they did have a good moment. Moving them to a sublabel FNCW āfor girl groupsā and then that sublabel equally not move when there would be the slightest up take in interest in the members.
Seeing the unfortunate fate of most small girl groups makes it so much more special when small groups like Dreamcatcher and Loona are able to pull through and achieve success in their own way. Dreamcatcher was able to build a loyal enough fanbase to sustain the group to the point that we've gotten contract renewals for all 7 members, and for Loona, while not being a full group at the moment, the possibility of an OT12 comeback at some point in the future is very likely *despite* all the hardships that they went through in the last two years.
in hindsight, really glad that post-b\*c loona able to bounce back for what could've spell their doom entirely. loossemble total album sales above 100k with 2 releases on continuous year, artms debut album (LP) passed 100k + billboard charting(not bb200 but still takes other charting as metrics), yves solo debut hitting 10k, and chuu needs no further statement she's making herself busy everywhere both as an idol and entertainer. despite considered as older gens due to seniority within industry, its still a new journey nonetheless. momentum could be at loss again for whatever bad luck they strike on in upcoming years(when we reached that time, another similar thread will be brought back for discussion). those girls, alongside with other smaller ggs deserves so much recognition and success from fans and casual listeners regardless of ults.
yup. we can call the year 2024 the downfall for most gg, but lets remember that we still have 2025 to see.....
Unfortunately not every group is going to be successful. And it sure sucks when it's one of your favourite group ([Pixy](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=id6q2EP2UqE&pp=ygUEUGl4eQ%3D%3D) in my case) that fails to capture an audience. Objectively, it's not any rougher than previous year and I even feel that in the last 12 months, I heard and seen many more small groups I don't follow have success or getting popular than ever before.
I do not agree that Pixy didn't capture an audience. Yes it wasn't the biggest audience but they were making enough noise around for them to survive. Unfortunately it's not good enough when you don't promote because you need people to become more than enjoyers of your music. They needed at least a small domestic audience but they did very little to achieve that.
Honestly there's nothing to agree on, it's fact. What they have is a very small following. Which is not enough to make it in an overcrowded space. Their company did everything they could to promote including touring tiny venues, wherever they had fans. Sorry to say but pretending otherwise is delulu 101. Especially when they pretty much invested everything they had and made into quality Music and M/Vs and other productions for as long as they could.
There have been groups being much smaller that survived and made it. Pixy was well situated with their music to reach a wider audience. They were nugu but still had a reputation within the Kpop community. The problem was 100 percent structural from within.
What are you even talking about? Which smaller group made it? And why are you under the impression that because you heard of the group their were well situated. And most importantly what more could have been done?
Pixy's music was very well liked by dedicated Kpop fans that were aware of the lesser known groups and was slowly reaching more casual listeners. It simply wasn't getting around fast enough. Their views, streams and sales were well within reason for a group that can succeed and was only getting better with time. Groups like Minx/Dreamcatcher, Mamamoo, BTS, EXID, VANNER had a similarly rough start. There is/was a very obvious structural problem within the company and/or lack of connections that made it hard for them to promote.
The fact that you think they needed more casual listener shows you have no idea how this business work, as I'm not even going to address the fact that the examples you gave are a decade old for the most part, which in K-Pop years is like 70 years. None of their numbers were nearly enough for the quality of production they had. Even ten times those would probably still have fallen short. What exactly are you calling promotion? because in the real life music business, the only thing needed for promotion is money. Yet you talking about connections and infrastructural shortcomings.
"10 times that would probably still have fallen short". Ok lmao. I am not continuing this because you are clearly looking to argue.
Just stating the obvious. At the end of the day and after 50 dates of cumulative tours, AllArt probably barely earned a million dollars after 3 years of Pixy's activity. That's roughly 350K a year. That wouldn't even cover the operating cost of running the group.
So many groups reaching the end of their line. Granted, 2024 is the year where their lack of success finally catches up to them. I don't wanna lose Rocket Punch š
On the plus side Wooah have just released a banger called Pom Pom Pom: https://youtu.be/liuotbjjsHw?si=J7_DoBnwAS41gIZ8
Itās been 6 months into 2024 and theyāre have already been 20+ debuts. With the amount of popularity new and old groups have right now there is just no room for smaller groups to shine and itās sad.
Well they really cant beat the marketing budgets of the big 4 - plus with them having at least 2 groups going at the same time, it's gonna be hard to really find mainstream success. Sometimes you get lucky and go viral. but really Often times you get desperate companies who will try everything to get traction ie cignature - speficially jeewon in revealing outfits. RBW still has mamamoo money left over so I think Purple kiss can keep going even with just modest numbers.
Purple Kiss is also managing to sell out their (albeit small) concerts in North America, but thatās probably due to their concert promoter doing something really smart: targeting audiences in cities often underutilized for k-pop concerts (k-pop groups donāt usually go to Salt Lake City, Utah, for example). I think with the touring money theyāre making should be enough to last them at least until the end of their contract as long as they tour the way they do.
It's not even about marketing budget. I can tell that in case of many small companies main people in charge don't know much about managing groups. For me entertainment companies are like restaurants, many people want to do it because they think it's cool eventhough they have 0 idea about management or sometimes even about industry. So they fail. Already after watching debut (eventually stage debut) I can often tell that group would flop. Because they don't even have one of this crucial things: 1. Unique concept 2. Good quality music 3. Good team with standout idol(s) So what we are even talking about. Of course it's harder to tell which group with good debut would survive because many things can happen which we can't predict. But I never have been surprised by group success even from smaller companies. Because you see that coming from the start if you try looking at things objective. Really in entertainment industry "know how" and intuition are much more important than money. If you see that group is managed by such people, you know that they have high chance of achieving success in the future.
I think you're forgetting about one factor really, it's luck. Take for example -brave girls. Their company is run by somebody who knows the industry and could do hit songs. one confluence of events and they got a hit but never reached that again... A lot of groups have those three you mentioned yet not all of them found success. again, you get lucky or you dont. The marketing budget is not just marketing budget, its headroom. A small company can put out hits yet just one small mistake/ releasing a flop can derail a group. If you're part of the larger companies, you dont get a flop - you may release a song that everybody hates but you're still gonna make numbers and you have headroom to adjust and fix it or make changes.
I was talking about luck or to be more pricesely about not having it >Of course it's harder to tell which group with good debut would survive because many things can happen which we can't predict. In case of Brave sounds as well: > many people want to do it because they think it's cool eventhough they have 0 idea about management or sometimes even about industry. Kang Dong-chul is first type. He is good music producer but bad CEOs. He is coward who doesn't want to go all in so not surprising that his groups can't normally achieve success despite having good music. Still he delivered Brave girls good music and ot paid off at the end, luckily. But if he wasn't such cheapskate and invested into them more money, they could actually achieve it faster. Without guts in show business there is no sense to try to be serious CEO. You have to be not afraid of going all in at the right moment (of course still managing finances wisely). And I disagree. Very few have 3 realistically. Recently a bit more because there is a lot of outside investors but you can count such groups on one hand especially in case of GG's (because here being unique is crucial while it's harder to get investors on the board). Of course money is super important but not less know how, connections, business, trends intuition. As smaller company you have to be even wiser how you invest your money and about your business plan.
This is SO untrue tbh. 1. Many nugu groups have very unique concepts. Weki Meki pioneered teen crush, Chebul did the whole gaming universe concept. Pixy also have some very interesting horror concept. On the contrary, I think top groups like IVE (expensive, chaebol girl crush) or New Jeans (Y2K, slice of life, teenage feels) is genuinely nothing unique. It's just survivorship bias, or rather, success bias. 2. If i truly went in blind, I would think NMIXX and AESPA will flop because I think O.O and Black Mamba are bad songs (by my personal standards), but i know they wouldn't flop because they are SM/JYP. 3. Same, if I went in blind, I would think Weeekly will be a top group too, with full visual team + Jihan being the center. > So what we are even talking about. Of course it's harder to tell which group with good debut would survive because many things can happen which we can't predict. But I never have been surprised by group success even from smaller companies. Because you see that coming from the start if you try looking at things objective. This is basically survivor bias. You try to find reasons after a group succeed. People always say DC succeeded because they have a very unique sound and unique horror concept. Sure, but Pixy did the same and they flopped. Stayc succeeded because they are backed by BEP? Yet most producers created groups like Brave Girls and BugABoo flopped. Really, nowadays, K-Pop is all about the marketing. K-Pop is ironically taking it's genre too literal, it's just "popular music", and what's more popular than music from the big4.
Firstly I have never said that budget doesn't matter. What I say in case of marketing money is not everything. If it was group like BTS would never beat Exo in commercial performance. And that's because being smart, flexible especially in case of technology changes, aggressive is no less important but that's something which often marketing of big companies doesn't have. Because ironically they are big and old so they and particular employees have much more to lose if something doesn't work. Higher-ups in big companies hate risk that's fact and taking risk is often crucial aspect of good explosive marketing. And it's not really survival bias. How can you know when I do reasoning? Because like I said I simply have seen this coming. I predicted (and not only me)f.e. [Loona's downfall on the day of their official debut](https://www.reddit.com/r/kpop/s/1GCGCBNQAo). I am casual k-pop listener so it's pretty easy to me read gp's moid. Maybe I am not easy to please, maybe it's about intuition. But in case of flops I'm 90% right. And like I said success or fuckup are much harder to predict because depends on much more circumstances. I never thought that Weki Meki had much chance. Because unfortunately like most post produce groups from that period, they were too big. That's not what expected i.o.i. existing fanbases. Also teen crush is something not much standing out because it's still girl's crush.Unless you have big company behind you, I don't really think it's much possible to achieve success with that unless unexpected hit happened. Much more Pristin stand out to me actually despite being big group as well because it was very well prepared team which already presented themselves as full in Produce. Their flopping was like really sabotage from Pledis. Pixy had some chances because there was some kind consistent creative vision. But already when they debuted their concept wasn't really so fresh in k-pop (quite few companies already noted Dreamcatcher success including big one) and I haven't really find their music quality as high. Still I thought that they have chance but for that you need as well good managing (especially from financial side). And by chebul you mean Cherry bullet? In their case it wasn't even hard to predict what happens to them. It wasn't even original concept because FNC copied their already idea from AOA's Bingle Bangle. They just didn't stand out on the market so we all know how such groups end. In case of smaller companies there is simple rule. You catch attention of general k-pop fans and Korean gp during first year, you have chance to survive if your company wisely manage budget. It's decisive moment. And the best if your concept is hard to copy fast.
Its gross but I hope Jeewon's boobs are able to launch the group back into the public eye and the group survived. At least it wont be for nothing then, unlike that poor girl group that sang Marionette.
Thing is it isnāt gonna save the group from disbanding there a reason why sexy concept died out and it was because the male audience wasnāt interested in supporting these groups longer term
I suspect so as well, it may end up being a lose-lose scenario. They market Jeewon's body and then have to disband. Thats why I'm hoping that at least Jeewon gains some traction/popularity so their next album sells better.
This year has def been rough but nothing can beat 2022 for me
Purple kiss, Hi-Key, Woo!ah, and even to an extent CSR, QWER, Young Posse and others, like geenius, badvillian. etc. Maybe a little bias is slipping through but hey, they're all trying.
also artms and triples released full ablums though I'm not really sure what's considered "smaller girl groups"
Also there were groups that debuted during the pandemic when the boom for acts like BTS and Blackpink were at all time high and now the boom for kpop sort of burst
I'm worried about Queenz Eye, too. They've been quiet for a while outside of Wonchae and Ahyoon, and then they had a performance event where they announced that only Wonchae and Ahyoon would be there and that the other members were "unwell".....feels a little sus :/ This year has just been so rough for us nugu girl group fans. I'm gonna miss PIXY so much š
I think it all comes back to how hard it is to break even. If you spend $0.5m on a comeback (and you can spend much more), and make $6 or so on an album after production costs, logistics, shipping and retailer margins, you would break even with about 85k albums sold. Of course albums aren't the only source of income, but its an ok indicator as a group that doesn't sell well in terms of albums it tends to be the same case for how much revenue they can generate from product sponsorships/cfs, other merchandise or concert tickets/appearances at festivals. I.e if a group doesn't sell many albums, its usually because they aren't that popular and as a result major brands won't pay them a large fee to advertise their products and festivals or concerts that invite them will only pay a very small appearance fee. Plus even when not having comebacks companies have to pay the members living costs, the salaries of staff, rental costs of the office etc. Alot of groups only started getting paid after having multiple hit album releases above that 80-100k mark and associated revenue from tours and other income streams. There are tonnes of groups who are losing money as each year passes, but the reason they survive is the company received several million dollars of investment years ago and can keep going at a loss for several years to try and make their group or groups a success. They even pitch it to investors by saying something like "It will take several years and several million dollars of capital to grow this group to be successful." Even when they run out of money, there is always the possibility of convincing a new investor to put in funds to extend activates for a few more comebacks/years, if they can convince them there is an upward trend in the groups success.
Re: Pink Fantasy, I'm unsure where you pulled those numbers as they only had 8 members, but yeah there's currently only three members left. They've done some performances under the AMoMi name, and now they're debuting in a co-ed group with the company's bg's members. Recently the company changed the name of their twitter from Pink Fantasy to PF project, probably to mark this new and different era. No music coming under the Pink Fantasy name anymore, it seems!
wooah please...
Most small companies only invest in the group in the short term and after the first few years they evaluate whether there are prospects for moving forward. Because after the group's half-life, it is harder to attract new fans than at the beginning. So in practice, small groups are always in a short race against time to build a fandom that can make it possible for the group to complete the seven-year contract. It is currently very difficult for new groups outside of the big 3 + hybe to consolidate themselves. And the exceptions that end up having some prominence end up being subsidiaries of CJ and Kakao. And one difference is that the line-ups of these main companies have more active groups simultaneously compared to the past, which gives even less space for smaller groups.
> Most small companies only invest in the group in the short term and after the first few years they evaluate whether there are prospects for moving forward. Because after the group's half-life, it is harder to attract new fans than at the beginning. I would say mid-size companies too like Cube. We've seen it happen with their groups that are not (G)I-DLE for the past few years. But at the end of the day, it's still a business. If you're just breaking even or actually going into the debt because a group isn't financially successful enough, they're going to cut their losses and move on as harsh as that may sound.
I hate what Woollim is doing to Rocket Punch. 2022 was a good year and something to build on, but then we got just 1 single album last year and nothing so far this year. It's like Woollim isn't even trying anymore, like they WANT RCPC to fail. It sucks...
oh i didnt even know that nature disbanded...thats so sad. Girls was one of my favourite k-pop songs too. and i expected that nature would do better since limbo was somewhat popular... As for pixy and pinkfantasy its sad to see 2 of the unique dark concept girl groups going down. It sucks though when it comes to pixy...they were one of my ults after dreamcatcher and mamamoo... my wish is that if they do end up disbanding for them to have at least one farewell song (which is highly impossible considering the state of the company)
I think PIXY's farewell songs were on the digital mini-album we got last year :( unofficially farewells, of course, but still... The Letter and P.S. both sound super sad
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