Former BESTie Member Uji Confesses That She Didn’t Make 1 Cent During Her Girl Group Career

Former BESTie member Uji recently sat down with Recent Olympics on YouTube to talk about her life journey, including her career endeavors. A part of her career journey included her time as a girl group member, with whom she promoted with for 6 years. As Uji discussed her time in BESTie, she also shared the heartbreaking reality of the K-Pop industry as a member of a lesser known K-Pop group.

Uji started off the video by sharing her deep thoughts about why she believes it’s her fault that the group didn’t live up to the public’s expectations.

Usually, if one member does well and receives the spotlight, their team also receives the spotlight. I was given a lot of those opportunities, but in my opinion, I always did a bad job.

— Uji

She continued by confessing that because she believed she was lacking in so many ways, she “felt sorry” to her fellow members, her label, and her label’s staff.

I felt like I wasn’t helpful to my team. So I felt sorry for my members, my label’s CEO, and the label’s staff. Those kinds of moments were really hard for me.

— Uji

The former BESTie member then touched on the hardships that came with the group’s disbandment news.

I can’t get into too many details, but there were a lot of internal problems at our company. My self-esteem was very low at the time. I often questioned myself, thinking ‘am I not a person worthy of love?’ I thought about that a lot.

— Uji

She then heartbreakingly confessed that during her entire career as a former girl group member, she didn’t even make ₩10 KRW (about $0.01 USD).

During my entire girl group career, I didn’t even receive ₩10 KRW (about $0.01 USD). With girl groups, unless you’re extremely successful, it’s hard to make an income.

— Uji

BESTie was a four member girl group that debuted in 2013 under YNB Entertainment. They made headlines prior to their debut, as three of the members Hyeyeon, Haeryung, and Uji previously debuted with EXID before departing due to unknown differences. The girls debuted with “Pitapat,” with which they were able to see some success as they went on to perform on numerous different music shows.

The girl group continued to promote diligently throughout their 4-year career, releasing “Thank U Very Much” and “Excuse Me,” which ended up seeing the most success out of all of their releases. And while the group started to slowly climb up the ranks, they were unable to see the massive success they should have experienced. In 2017, two members departed from the group, ultimately leading to the disbandment of BESTie.

While her girl group days may be over, Uji has been busy promoting actively as a musical actress following her departure from BESTie. Uji discusses more about her musical actress endeavors in the Recent Olympics interview, which you can watch below.