This article (link goes to Music Business Worldwide) came across my feed roughly a month ago and I did mention it in one of the weekly chats here but I do feel that more people need to be aware of what HYBE is doing.
HYBE, the South Korean entertainment giant behind BTS – arguably the world’s biggest K-pop act – is planning to spend 2026 developing “a new experience model based on scarcity,” according to company CEO Jason Jaesang Lee.
“Scarcity is an important element that enhances the added value of the fan experience,” Lee said in a New Year address to HYBE staff, as reported in media sources in South Korea.
”To innovate future fandom businesses, we will design and test an integrated online and offline experience model based on scarcity.”
IMO scarcity creates an “us vs them” scenario, where the wealthy are given access mere mortals are denied. It might not be targeting just the wealthy but those who are lucky and that also creates an "us vs them" scenario and could lead to animosity amongst fans, potentially dividing the fandom.
ARMYs have stood by BTS through thick and thin and now they want to roll out this scarcity tactic. This feels like such a slap in the face to fans.
While Lee was short on details, this raises red flags for me. We've seen a few instances where they're either very un-prepared or it's all part of this scarcity tactic – membership freezing, lightstick purchase issues – and it has me wondering what this means for future events.
A few fans have mentioned "it's like they don't know how big BTS is" but that makes me think that they've deployed this scarcity tactic with many fans not understanding what's going on.
I hope this is okay to post and I wasn't sure on the correct flair.
They’ve done this for ages. Every merch drop sells out only for it to reappear on Weverse months later or at a BTS pop up because they didn’t actually sell out.
They make you feel like you were lucky to get what you have so you don’t balk on the purchase over price or quality.
They’re going to have enough light sticks, but if I manage to get the two I need I won’t worry about the $150 price tag because I will be happy just to get them at all.
I worked as a buyer for a university and know a lot of buyers in the private sector. People spend money based on perceived value within the parameters of their budget. If a company can make a product seem invaluable, then they will always have consumers.
The good news is listening to BTS is a music subscription and it’s the least expensive and best part of being a fan.
I agree, I saw that article going around, and every move Hybe has been making since then seems to validate the statement. Things like preorders and digital memberships selling out, the lightstick situation yesterday etc. it could of course be planned inventory rollout. I just hope most ARMY are aware and make informed purchases. Let’s not panic or fall prey to FOMO. The most important thing is to support BTS and their art, but we should also keep on guard against such marketing tactics.
I think moving toward this shows a fundamental misunderstanding of why BTS became so huge besides their great music—because the members are open as people and made so much free content/did free livestreams to connect with many fans in a way that felt two sided and authentic.
For merch? Whatever, I’m not that pressed personally even though that sucks. But I think a lot of people are going to be really upset if they start paywalling more content, and it hasn’t seemed like that’s something the guys want, either.
Yeah this is not new. Most of their merch has been limited, drops have always been chaos.
Tbh I found it funny that during the HOTS tour everyone was going crazy over those acorn keychains. Queuing for hours, reselling for ridiculous prices just for the And What Hybe exhibition to be selling the whole set at the end of Hobis tour. I’m not saying people are gullible lol but FOMO and scarcity definitely affect the majority of fans when it comes to the ‘concert’ experience.
Lol i hear some army stans give bts and the healthy armies a bad name this is true but hybe is right there with the bad armie stands for pulling this shit 🫠
it feels like there’s two different models being discussed here? (I know nothing about marketing so please correct me if I’m misunderstanding!)
1. scarcity as in, creating an artificial feeling that things will sell out (eg online membership, army bomb) to create urgency, when in fact there’s plenty of stock. I don’t mind that so much, it’s annoying but as long as you can see the tactic for what it is, it doesn’t affect you.
2. scarcity as in, creating a tiered systems with higher price points for experiences or items that are restricted in numbers – so the idea of higher prices for VIP seats I guess, but artificially creating that scarcity for things that don’t actually need to be restricted in numbers. I don’t know what that would be exactly – fan meets? limited editions for albums and merch? Of course it also already exists to some degree, but I feel that’s more insidious if they do develop it a lot, because it can create fomo and resentment.
This makes sense given that scarcity of the merch could drive people to panic buy even if they set high prices for it. Really shitty knowing ARMY will try to show support to BTS as much as we can.
I personally have my own set budget for BTS merch and they are more reserved for the light stick and concert tickets and decided to just buy stuff only if I can afford to purchase them in cash instead of through credit cards to keep myself from buying stuff I don’t need.
As someone who has worked on online shop implementations and setups, I think it’s just poor management when it comes to the weverse shop. Depending on the coding, there would be a maximum inventory quantity that they can set up on the shop’s backend for each item. They don’t have a good admin to go in and update the shop items more regularly. That’s why they do multiple drops for merch. There’s premade inventory and also preorder drops.
The membership sellout was very likely due to a poor setting and not updating the backend inventory amount. From my experience, there’s likely a toggle that can make a digital subscription unlimited or set inventory quantities. It was probably set to a certain quantity and wasn’t switched to unlimited quantity. It’s poor business decisions if they decided membership and lightsticks are part of their scarcity model. Memberships are free money in a way because hybe and weverse don’t need to do anything after someone becomes a member. They wouldn’t limit people from getting a membership. There were more people buying memberships than available concert tickets. If hybe decided to limit membership purchases, then they were deciding to throw free money away.
Lightstick scarcity would be dumb too because they would have a sea of white lights or black at the concerts. Lightstick shows are part of the kpop concert experience. It would be silly to limit that. The artists like the lightstick shows too.
Just from my experience, you’ll be very surprised at how poorly online shops are maintained. I honestly think they don’t have good admins managing the shop. They probably also don’t have a good workflow in place to manage influx orders. So they manage it via different drops. Since this isn’t constant, they can’t simply just hire all the extra people needed to manage it. If that’s the case, they have the same amount of employees trying to manage.
I do think they’ll have more exclusive drops in a scarcity model. It’ll be interesting to see how that plays out. They’ll need to find a balance of holding back too much and paywalling certain things. Otherwise, fans will jump ship or resort to pirating content. It also brings in replicas which cuts into their own profits. This might play into the kpop industry contraction and also economic changes.
Army please don’t buy into the FOMO. Example, they have been careful not to tell us to just go buy the vinyls which are Target exclusives (except Modern Korea version) at Target because there is no real shortage there AND Target has a better return policy plus you can see it in person. The “limited one press” of Taylor Swift’s Life of a Showgirl album is still in stores, so I seriously doubt they will even sell out of these colored vinyls. Also I know many of us in the US are not happy with Target right now, but this is just to remind you to make informed decisions, and don’t judge because maybe an Army buys nothing else from Target all year. I’m sure, too, the tour merch will reappear later, so if you can’t decide what to buy just save your money, and if it shows up later AND you still want it, then buy it.
> IMO scarcity creates an “us vs them” scenario, where the wealthy are given access mere mortals are denied
When I first came across the article, this was my first thought. Eventually, there will be very little left for those who can’t afford things. I don’t know about dividing the fandom (I think that ship has sailed) but I can see it affecting ARMY negatively. Feeling like they’re not “good enough” or like the fandom isn’t meant for them (if that makes sense).
I do think this is stuff that the members don’t really think about. Not that they don’t care or that this is how they want things, but that they’re focused on the music and performance and leave the business up to Hybe.
To be honest I really don’t care what Hybe is doing, because I don’t particularly care about buying merch. I don’t see why I should. I’m a BTS fan, not a merch fan. Businesses exist to get as much money out of you as they can – they don’t care if you’ve been with a band through thick and thin and they never will. Time to accept it.
I see some Armies online extremely invested in everything Hybe is doing and I don’t think it’s healthy for their mental health. You won’t change the company, but you can choose to treat merch for what it is, which is only a side dish. The only main dish here is BTS and their music. The company that happens to manage them does not have to be your problem. Don’t think about Hybe and about the merch too much and you’ll be a really happy Army.
I’m sorry, but a lot of you tend to take the worst possible interpretation of everything just to get upset. There’s nothing in this article that mentions lightsticks or memberships at all being victim of this new tactic, and I know you did not either, but you are implying so. It seems like they’re talking more about things like pre-ticketing, performances, music, etc., instead.
I think K-pop has always leaned into constantly pumping out things just to feed the fandom, and that creates a lot of entitlement. Even within ARMY, you see people saying they want this or that because they made BTS successful, as if that gives them control over what the group does. I don’t really buy into that mindset.
>ARMYs have stood by BTS through thick and thin and now they want to roll out this scarcity tactic. This feels like such a slap in the face to fans.
See, your comment raise a red flag for me.
I honestly think K-pop needs to introduce scarcity. Artists should be allowed to take their time between releases, focus on proper promotions, and not feel pressured to constantly push out things. It actually makes me think of Beyoncé, because she’s so intentional about what she does and when she does it, everything now carries more hype, purpose, and demand.
this is already happening, last year CORTIS’ seasons greetings sold out, i’ve never seen a seasons greeting sold out in hours, then they did “batches” for some reason. a new batch would open few hours later and then they gave up and just opened stock as normal
CORTIS also have a plush album version that sold out in minutes, fans have been begging to come back in stock for weeks and they simply did not restock
What I find frustrating is that Hybe has enough people on staff to be able to manage an online shop. I’m surprised they didn’t have enough server space or operations to anticipate the demand an army bomb drop would create and that there is no “waiting room” set up. I’ve seen for a lot beauty drops or other hell even Ticketmaster, where most users get funneled into a waiting room where there is a visible tracker with their place in line and it keeps them from rabidly refreshing the page and causing a ddos attack and kills everyone’s ability to buy things in a sane and ordered way instead of the wild Wild West
When I first read about the scarcity model, I thought they were talking about exclusive experiences, limited editions. Therefore, I don’t think standard membership subscriptions or light sticks fit into that logic. I consider server or stock issues to be more relevant. However, since much of the fandom logic is driven by FOMO, the result is that these problems lead to more demand.
I thought it was really weird that Weverse was sold out of a pre order album – 2 months away. Yes, it’s now available for preorder again, but.. does it make sense if this scarcity plot wasn’t true? Plus with all the editions it seems like a cash grab, and Hybe is taking advantage of our loyalty. I was “lucky” and got a nosebleed seat. Maybe I just don’t need a light stick if that’s how they want to play.