Finally some hard numbers for physical sales vs digital sales

    Here is a breakdown of EDAM Ent's 2021 revenue as reported by The Official Audit Report of 2021 Agency Income. IU was the only artist under EDAM for this report (EDAM signed Shin Sekyung in the 3rd quarter of 2021).


    IU's 2021 REVENUE

    Album sales: 4.1 billion won

    Music (digital) sales: 9.6 billion won

    Merch: 3.2 billion won

    CFs: 11.7 billion won


    This means IU generated 29.5 billion won (~23 million usd) for her agency last year. We don't know what her cut of this revenue is, though she owns 30% of EDAM.


    In 2021, IU's had 6.3 billion (6,326,951,758) digital index points and sold ~400k albums on Gaon.


    So between the two: 6.3 billion digital index points vs 400k physical albums, that was a difference of 9.6 billion won vs 4.1 billion won in favor of the digital sales. (Note that IU's has writing credits on all her songs, so the royalty split may be more favorable for digitals.)


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    Should be noted that digital revenue will also include sources thats not included in the gaon digitals, like spotify, youtube, radio etc. So cant really do a 1:1 between the revenue and digital points here.

    No revenue from concerts obviously, since there was a pandemic in 2021.

    ₩4,113,098,000 ÷ 400,000 albums = ₩10,283 per album, or US$8.10 per album


    This seems high to me, since it implies that over 50% of the retail price (let's say US$14) of a typical album flows to the record label. Don't retailer and distributor margins take up a larger percentage of retail cost?

    Quote from wsoet

    ₩4,113,098,000 ÷ 400,000 albums = ₩10,283 per album, or US$8.10 per album


    This seems high to me, since it implies that over 50% of the retail price (let's say US$14) of a typical album flows to the record label. Don't retailer and distributor margins take up a larger percentage of retail cost?

    400k is Lilac sales - there may have been back catalog sales of older albums which I was too lazy to sit through Gaon monthly for. Generally I assume albums cost 40% of manufacturing + production and 20% of retailer/distribution.

    Quote from pchromo4

    400k is Lilac sales - there may have been back catalog sales of older albums which I was too lazy to sit through Gaon monthly for. Generally I assume albums cost 40% of manufacturing + production and 20% of retailer/distribution.

    According to data compiled by halfdavid on Twitter, IU's 2021 Gaon physical sales number was 454,857. This doesn't change our calculations very much.


    Now 20% for retailer/distributor margin does seem low. Do we have any evidence to support those figures?

    Upon closer examination, I take issue with the image below:


    FRaL-CZVcAMzqN0?format=jpg


    According to Forbes itself, the SNS score is based on the sum of YouTube subscribers and Instagram followers. Here are the numbers they provided for the top 10 in the table above:


    BTS: 127 million

    Blackpink: 119.56 million

    Twice: 38 million

    IU: 33 million

    Lee Min-ho: 29.88 million

    Park Seo-joon: 21.48 million

    Suzy: 17.48 million

    Park Shin-hye: 13.46 million

    Kim Soo-hyeon: 13.34 million

    Song Hye-kyo: 12.87 million


    However, it took me literally seconds to notice an omission in their list: EXO. EXO has 8.79 million subscribers and 9.8 million followers, for a total of 18.59 million, yet they are nowhere to be found. If it was this easy to discover a mistake in Forbes' data, how can we even trust these results?

    Edited once, last by wsoet ().

    That Forbes data and ranking is wacked. They don’t count group accounts. BTS always had low numbers even though they were the biggest influencers on and just because they lacked Instagram accounts. Instagram is favored highly imo

    Quote from wsoet

    According to data compiled by halfdavid on Twitter, IU's 2021 Gaon physical sales number was 454,857. This doesn't change our calculations very much.


    Now 20% for retailer/distributor margin does seem low. Do we have any evidence to support those figures?


    Just to be clear, the first twitter post is the actual audit report for edam and has nothing to do with whatever forbes base their calculations on


    For the physicals revenue, it should maybe be noted that edam/iu is under Kakao M and their biggest artist. They are not just a label but also happens to be the biggest distributor of korean music. I dont think its too farfetched to think that she will have a deal that favours her more than what is usual when it comes to the share of profits and the cut kakao take as the distributor is minimal.


    As for these forbes lists they have never made much sense, and this year is no exception. Like, lee seungi ahead of yoo jaesuk. Another trot singer ahead of lyw, and them being in top 10 to begin with etc.

    Quote from Kreatin

    Just to be clear, the first twitter post is the actual audit report for edam and has nothing to do with whatever forbes base their calculations on

    Oh yeah, absolutely.

    Quote from Kreatin

    For the physicals revenue, it should maybe be noted that edam/iu is under Kakao M and their biggest artist. They are not just a label but also happens to be the biggest distributor of korean music. I dont think its too farfetched to think that she will have a deal that favours her more than what is usual when it comes to the share of profits and the cut kakao take as the distributor is minimal.

    Great point. I'd forgotten that Edam is part of Kakao.

    Quote from Kreatin

    As for these forbes lists they have never made much sense, and this year is no exception. Like, lee seungi ahead of yoo jaesuk. Another trot singer ahead of lyw, and them being in top 10 to begin with etc.

    Yes, I remember these Forbes rankings not making much sense in the past as well. I wish they'd be more transparent about how they arrived at their calculations.


    And another obvious omission from the SNS top 10: Itzy with 7.12 million subscribers and 16.2 million followers, for 23.32 million in total.

    Quote from coreyruvalcava

    I am glad they are making that big of an income. But does someone know if these people are declaring all their income? I heard about these schemes when you do not declare your income to not pay the taxes. I recently read an article on the https://www.natlawreview.com/a…-step-response-strategies website, and I got really interested. Did you know that in 2022 the number of financial frauds had increased significantly? So the possibility that this company is also scamming the government is pretty big.

    IU is a national tax ambassador (the national tax service recognized her as someone who's been diligent about paying taxes) so the chances are low.

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