K-beauty meets K-pop as Olive Young rides cultural wave

K-beauty meets K-pop as Olive Young rides cultural wave

최초입력 2025.06.30 14:04:30

(Olive Young)

As the global K-pop fandom expands into broader K-culture, CJ Olive Young is benefiting from the surge of interest as it sees a marked boost in sales from K-pop albums and merchandise. The popular beauty retailer, now dubbed a K-beauty mecca, is also attracting waves of K-pop fans.
Olive Young said on Sunday that sales in its K-pop category on the Olive Young Global Mall, its overseas online platform, jumped 240 percent in the first half of 2025 compared to the same period a year ago. Domestic store sales in the same category rose 220 percent while three Olive Young locations -Myeongdong Station, Myeongdong Town, and Olive Young N Seongsu - currently sell K-pop merchandise.
Olive Young added a dedicated K-pop category to its global online store in May 2022, responding to the rising global popularity of Korean music. Available in 150 countries, the platform offers more than 8,000 K-beauty and K-health products alongside over 2,000 K-pop albums and fan items. The move quickly paid off, with the category’s sales figures soaring 138 percent within a year. International fans are drawn to Olive Young not only for access to official charts-recognized albums but also for exclusive perks including photo cards and posters. North American customers, in particular, benefit from free shipping on orders over $60.
The synergy between K-pop and K-beauty has always been strong, with Olive Young finding that 71 percent of first-time global customers who purchased K-pop items went on to buy K-beauty products as well. Sixty-six percent of those who initially bought only K-pop products returned for beauty items in future purchases and buoyed by this trend, Olive Young introduced K-pop sections in select physical stores popular with tourists. It launched its first in-store K-pop corner at the Myeongdong Station location in August 2024 that was expanded to Olive Young N Seongsu in November, where it created the “K-POP NOW” zone.

(Olive Young)

Olive Young additionally hosted 19 pop-up stores in 2024 at tourist-heavy locations including Myeongdong Town and Gangnam Town. The pop-ups were extended to Hongdae Trendpot and the newly opened Hongdae Playground location in 2025, bringing the total to six. These spaces offer more than just albums and merchandise, with photo zones, message walls for fans, and giveaway events making them a major draw - around 60 percent of visitors are international fans.
Meanwhile, Korean cosmetics exports surpassed those of the United States for the first time. According to the Korea International Trade Association, Korea exported $3.6 billion in cosmetics from January to April 2025, topping the U.S.’ $3.57 billion figure during the same period.
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K-beauty meets K-pop as Olive Young rides cultural wave

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