BT21 character products to launch in Seoul, New York

BT21, a set of characters created by K-pop boy band BTS and Naver’s Line Friends, will launch its character products in Seoul and New York.

Line Friends said Monday that it would open a pop-up store for the character merchandise at Boon the Shop in Cheongdam-dong, Seoul from Saturday to Jan. 14, 2018. It will also open “BT21 Zone” in its flagship store in New York on Saturday.

Character-related merchandise such as dolls, cushions and fashion items will be available at the stores. The Seoul pop-up store will also feature some limited item sets which include postcards and posters of the original drawings by BTS members, BT21’s character cushions and bag charms. 

“We are confident about the successful launch (of the merchandise) as we have constantly received inquiries from the global fans on the BT21 character products since the characters’ release,” Line Friends said.

The BT21-themed products will become available early next year at Line Friends flagship stores here and its official online store. After their launch at the New York store, the character products will be sold at Line Friends’ flagship stores in Japan, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Thailand. 

Inspired by the drawings of BTS members, BT21 consists of eight characters: seven correlating to each of the seven bandmates -- RJ (Jin), Shooky (Suga), Mang (J-Hope), Koya (RM), Chimmy (Jimin), Tata (V) and Cooky (Jungkook) -- and the final character Van representing the band and its fandom, Army.

Since it was first unveiled in September, BT21 enjoyed high popularity, with over 200 million Twitter exposures while their “stickers” (Line App emoji) have been downloaded over 17 million times.

By Kim So-yeon (syk19372@heraldcorp.com)