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Play M and Cre.Ker merge, fans of Apink, Victon and The Boyz pray for equal treatment

A fan wrote, 'Please treat all the artist equally. Give them more budget in their promotion'

Earlier there were rumors that the K-pop agencies Play M Entertainment and Cre.Ker Entertainment were in talks of a new partnership. Well, as of November 12, it has been confirmed that the two agencies will be merging and creating a new company under the name IST Entertainment. Cre.Ker was a subsidiary label of the megacorporation Kakao Entertainment and only housed the K-pop group The Boyz. Play M too happened to be under Kakao but since it was launched in 2011, handles several notable groups like Apink and Victon.

Apink was the first group of Play M and then they later went on to form the band Bandage and their second girl group Weeekly. They had also signed with IU till 2019 and currently, their popular solo trainee happens to be none other than Huening Bahiyyih. Sister to TXT’s Kai, Bahiyyih ranked #2 on Mnet’s survival show ‘Girls Planet 999’ and joined the project group Kep1er. And so, despite housing such big names, fans claim that Play M has not been doing their best for their artists which they hope will now change with their merger with Cre.Ker.

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Groups under Play M and Cre.Ker are now labelmates

With The Boyz being the only artists under Cre.Ker, their activities and comebacks have always been satisfactory. They have the freedom to talk about whatever they want in their lives and be hands-on during their comebacks. The behind-the-scenes footage of the survival shows ‘Road to Kingdom’ and ‘Kingdom’ showed how they stretched their limits with the staff accommodating them. On the other hand, fans of the artists under Play M have often complained about mistreatment.

Weeekly is currently one of the most popular rookie groups with viral hits like ‘After School’ while Apink had always been part of the conversation when it came to leading second-gen girl groups. Unfortunately, fans of Weeekly claim that the label is playing it safe with their high teen concept and bubblegum-pop music while Apink’s comebacks have become so infrequent that their last album was released in April 2020. And with Naeun leaving the label, Pink Pandas (Apink’s fandom) feel that Play M is leaving her out of Apink’s group activities.

As for Victon, with Seungwoo enlisting, their military era has begun and fans of both Victon and The Boyz hope that there can be some collaborations and interactions before all of the members enlist. A multifan posted, “Victon and tbz in the same room seems like absolute chaos.” Apink’s fans seemed the angriest as Weeekly had two comebacks this year, “Give Apink comeback first then talk! i dont care you're play M or Ist IDAF.” Another fan shared, “Please treat all the artist equally. Give them more budget in their promotion.” A Weeekly fan commented, “Hope they can spend higher budget for weeekly.” A The Boyz fan added, “Please give the boyz the same treatment like before this :) i will miss their VLive inside their studio.”