The top 3 wasteful companies have also been determined.
Koreaboo
In recent years, K-Pop companies have been getting increasing criticism for releasing multiple versions of the same album and having dozens or more different photocards for fans to collect in said albums. This practice has led not only to the inflation of album sales, but also to a huge problem with waste as fans toss the albums once they get what they wanted, whether it be the photocards or a chance for a fancall with an idol.
By this point, you’ve probably already seen images of tons of K-Pop albums being discarded on the street or elsewhere. In some of the latest news regarding this ongoing issue, fans have shared their disappointment and outrage seeing loads of BTS Jungkook‘s solo album Golden being discarded in places like bathrooms and other seemingly random locations.
Translation: “This is not it..ㅡㅡ
Our precious Jungkook’s albums..
Were all thrown out in the restroom..”
Most of these albums are already rid of their plastic covering, which suggests that the photocards have already been taken from them and is why they were so mass-purchased to begin with.
SEVENTEEN‘s latest album, 17 IS RIGHT HERE, has been seen in the same sort of situation. Tons of the albums have been stripped of their photocards and left discarded for someone else to deal with.
In their case, netizens have been particularly skeptical about just how many albums they’ve been selling lately. SEVENTEEN has been breaking sales records for a while now, but a lot of people think those numbers are heavily inflated due to just how many are being tossed out.
Translation: “K-Pop Label Album Waste Increases Over 14X in 6 Years ‘HYBE, JYP, and Kakao in 1st, 2nd, and 3rd’”
Translation: “As for the waste levy, 11 record labels paid more than 190 million won as of 2020. HYBE paid the most at 130 million won, followed by JYP at 27 million won.”
Of course, it’s not just Jungkook and SEVENTEEN who are having this issue. Netizens shared examples of other albums being tossed out in the dozens in recent times, making it clear that this is a problem for the K-Pop industry as a whole, and that something needs to be done to resolve it.
Here’s what K-Pop fans have to say about this disheartening data and the images included.
What do you think should be done to eliminate this wasteful practice?
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