Psy success hikes brands' image

Psy smiles with food company CJ’s company logo as a backdrop during a press conference held ahead of his concert at Seoul World Cup Stadium Saturday. / Yonhap

By Park Si-soo

In this time of an economic slowdown, Psy’s release last Saturday of his new single “Gentleman” brought rare good news for companies that have signed up the 36-year-old pop star for their commercials.

The stock prices of instant noodle maker Nongshim and alcohol maker Hite-Jinro shot up Monday as Psy’s new music video passed more than 50 million views on YouTube, and may replicate the worldwide sensation of “Gangnam Style.” Buyers expect this will lead to brisker sales in overseas markets.

Nongshim has revised up its sales target for the United States for this year by 29 percent to $570 million, and other corporate beneficiaries are considering following suit. The stock price of Psy’s management agency YG Entertainment surged, as did that of Aurora, a character products maker with exclusive rights to sell Psy-related goods worldwide. YG’s stock price rose 13.48 percent to close at 85,000 won, Monday.

The county’s biggest food company CJ Group had its brand and key products exposed to “a great number of overseas potential consumers” by sponsoring Psy’s concert at the Seoul World Cup Stadium, Saturday, which was streamed live via YouTube. An estimated 150,000 people watched the show through the video-sharing website, according to YG.

“Our corporate banners were hanging everywhere in the venue during the concert and many of them were seen by overseas fans,” said Min Tae-jung, a CJ spokesman.

“Given the number of viewers, the promotional effect we earned through the concert was worth 10 times the value of our investment into this.” The spokesman refused to say how much the company paid to sponsor the show. CJ’s stock price jumped 0.7 percent to close at 143,000 won.

Meanwhile, Psy’s new music video rewrote YouTube’s records for single-day hits on Monday by racking up around 20 million hits in its first 24 hours, destroying the previous record for single-day views of 8 million, set by Canadian singer Justin Bieber’s “Boyfriend” video in May 2012.

The song landed at Number 61 for the week on Britain’s top 100 singles chart. “Gentleman” is also enjoying tremendous popularity on global iTunes’ charts. It went on sale online in 119 nations, Friday, and topped iTunes charts in 16, including Belgium, Cambodia, Finland, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand, as of Monday morning. It came in 25th on the U.S. iTunes chart.