According to industry experts, the cost of successfully forming, producing, and debuting an idol group is about 2,000,000,000 KRW (~ 1,800,000 USD). This amount includes the funds required for the trainees' board, meals, lessons, etc. The number of trainees a company houses at a time varies: for large companies like SM Entertainment, the number could be from 20-30, while for most small companies, the number is around 5
Quote:
Furthermore, for an idol group to "go around music shows promoting for a month can cost as much as 100,000,000 KRW (~ 90,000 USD)."
that's crazy, I wonder how they are able to recoup the advances when an A-list kpop group sells ~50k albums and 1m singles each era
it costs alot considering how much people don't buy music in South Korea
unless you meant how much a successful kpop group makes each era for their companies, then yes
most groups rely on touring, merch, Television show castings, and modelling to make back the money
Remember that if successful, they do CFs and movies and tours over the span of multiple albums per year so I don't think it's that hard to recoup.
Say they sell only 50k albums at the bare minimum album price in won, that's about ~800M already in KW
It definitely is a huge risk though because you never know if the group will become really successful. I wish they still did that here in the US. Now, labels give you the bare minimum and you have to make moves on your own and how it works out will tell if you get major backing or not.
