STAYC’s Album Sales For “Cheeky Icy Thang” Are Shockingly Low

Yesterday, we wrote on the topic of K-Pop girl group album sales, and whether or not they seem to be making an overall decline compared to the past couple of years. Artists like ITZY, aespa, TWICE, and others are seeing fewer sales with their most recent albums compared to the past couple before them, with some seemingly being hit harder than others.

There are many factors that could be contributing to this decline, such as the current economic situation in many countries and an increase in other things for K-Pop fans to spend their money on, such as concerts, following the COVID pandemic.

Still, this sudden drop could be a problem for artists that aren’t from major labels, and that seems like it could be the case for STAYC. Generally considered a mid-sized girl group, they’re the biggest income bringer for their label, High Up Entertainment.

Their previous album, Teenfresh (which was released in August 2023), was their best-selling to date with around 352,000 total sales. Before that, their Teddy Bear album, released in February 2023, was also successful with around 341,000 units sold.

Then the girl group went on a nearly year-long hiatus. Extended hiatuses can be a detriment to a K-Pop group, and that seems to have at least impacted STAYC’s success somewhat, considering just how much their album sales for their latest release, Metamorphic, have dropped.

Released on July 1, Metamorphic — which was STAYC’s first full-length studio album — should have performed well. However, with a title track (“Cheeky Icy Thang”) that was heavily criticized for being too experimental and hard to listen to, paired with other factors stated above, this new album has yet to surpass even the 100,000 sales mark. 

Seeing the daily sales in the first week compared to that of their last album gives an even clearer picture of just how much of a drop this is.

And in fact, this is the lowest sales number that one of STAYC’s albums has had since their 2021 release Staydom, which was only their second release since debut.

We can only hope for the members’ sake that this was just a poorly received comeback, and that their next album release will be more successful. STAYC is such a talented group that deserves the popularity they’d been receiving in the past couple years of their career, and hopefully High Up Entertainment uses this as a lesson to better promote and manage them in the future!