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LOONA’s fandom, ORBITs, is on track to successfully boycott the group's upcoming release. The boycott was the result of a combination of controversies and reports surrounding the group’s agency, Blockberry Creative.
Amidst all of this, ORBITs made a unanimous decision to boycott the group’s upcoming album, The Origin Album [0]. The sales numbers on Ktown4U, a major South Korean distributor website, have already reflected their success.
As of December 15, 2022, around 2 AM local US time, daily sales on Ktown4U remain at 32 for the set and a mere 11 for the random version. Hours later, at 9 AM, the numbers only increased to 36 for the set, while the other remained the same.
Pre-orders for the album have been open for a couple of days. It is scheduled for release on January 3, 2023. Although the numbers seem extremely poor, for ORBITs, it is a win.
ORBITs boycotting LOONA’s comeback results in heavily decreased sales
From terminating Chuu’s contract by claiming she verbally abused staff to reports saying nine members filed an injunction to terminate their own contracts, LOONA’s fandom has walked a rocky path over the past few months. This is also almost a year after South Korean outlets reported on a legal suit between Chuu and Blockberry Creative.
As soon as Blockberry Creative released a teaser poster for LOONA’s new album release, ORBITs began calling for a boycott. As per the fanbase union account on Twitter:
“The response team will continue boycotting until the accusatory comments against Chuu are retracted, an apology is made with regards to past mistreatment, and LOONA members are given the option to terminate their contract, if they wish to do so.”
As of December 15, 9 AM, Ktown4U, a website that showcases transparent sales, the group's The Origin Album [0] is still stuck in double digits. Fans celebrated the numbers on Twitter, while steadily maintaining that the ban is only to make the company falter and that they still love the LOONA members.
Take a look at some of the fans’ reactions below:
Some fans even brought up Yeojin’s reveal when she shared that she had not earned even a single penny since debuting over six years ago. Fans’ stance was that it was the company that was benefiting from the sales, not the members.
Since the artists themselves weren’t being paid despite their albums bringing in decent six-digit sales numbers, their plans to boycott fueled more determination.
In other news, Blockberry Creative responded to the news of nine members filing an injunction with a simple “no” to YTN Star on November 28, the same day JTBC released the report. However, fans noticed a pattern in the social media posts, which only have HyunJin and ViVi uploading their photos.
Coincidentally, only HyunJin and ViVi were reported to not have filed an injunction for contract termination. It remains to be seen whether LOONA’s fandom can continue to keep up with the boycott of The Origin Album [0] across platforms.
