Member-only story
Hey, What’s The Deal With K-Pop?
Testimony from an ex-anti of all things Korean Pop.
If you told me 2 years ago (yes, only 2 years ago!) that today, I will be a K-Pop fan, I’d probably flick you off. I’m not even exaggerating. I used to hate K-Pop. This deep-rooted hatred stemmed from being annoyed at how it flooded my social media feeds, the television screen, and billboards. Radios would frequently play K-pop songs as well.
I never understood the hype… Until I did.
My ‘anti’ phase is not something that I am proud of, and I’m a bit embarrassed that it took meeting my husband for me to realise how big of a deal this $5 billion industry is. BTS, for example, is worth over $3.6 billion a year to South Korea’s economy and is projected to bring in an economic value of $37 billion over the next 10 years according to the Hyundai Research Institute.
When I first fell into the K-Pop rabbit hole, I was overwhelmed and intimidated. There were so many things I didn’t understand (aside from the language barrier), but still I find myself coming back for more.
