[Courtesy of Gmarket's global shopping service]
SEOUL -- Foreign fans are rushing to South Korean online shopping malls to buy the new album of BTS that took the top place on Billboard 200 chart, reflecting the group's explosive popularity abroad.
Many music listeners buy music through online music services because they conveniently provide streaming music services and digital music files without the hassle of converting songs from CDs through digital players, but there are still some enthusiasts who wish to keep albums in a physical form.
South Korea's leading online shopping mall Gmarket, run by American online auction service eBay, said Tuesday that the number of overseas customers buying CDs through its global online service in May increased by about 40 percent from a year ago, with BTS' new album taking the lion's share.
Especially, the number of customers buying BTS' album spiked during the first week of May when the seven-member group received pre-orders, Kim Ye-ji, a Gmarket manager, told Aju News. "The number spiked by 106 percent on-year during the first week of May."
She said her company provides easy transaction and delivery service with multi-language support. From May 1 to 27, BTS fans from Taiwan took up 40 percent of total album sales, followed by Chinese fans with 11 percent. Southeast Asian fans accounted for 30 percent.
reporter
Park Sae-jin
swatchsjp@ajunews.com
