ADOR Min Hee Jin Claims GFRIEND’s Disbandment Had Nothing To Do With Her
This article is part of our coverage of HYBE vs. ADOR CEO Min Hee Jin. You can read more and view the entire timeline here.
ADOR CEO Min Hee Jin held a press conference on April 25, 2024. During the conference, she touched on the issue of GFRIEND’s disbandment. Many fans had been loudly and publicly accusing Min Hee Jin of causing Source Music and GFRIEND’s downfall. Min Hee Jin had once worked with Source Music to create a new girl group, but she later took the trainees that would become NewJeans with her when she established ADOR. It was widely circulated amongst fans that Min Hee Jin had intentionally left the training costs for Source Music to handle, and took their debut group with her (as well as some staff), resulting in the company failing to secure a renewal with GFRIEND for their contracts.
It has since been clarified that she did pay back at least a portion of the costs to Source Music. During the press conference, Min Hee Jin unequivocally stated that she did not play a part in their disbandment. In response to accusations that she stole Source Music’s debut group for ADOR, Min Hee Jin asserted that, at the time she entered the company, the only trainee she saw potential in was Minji. She went on to gush about how pretty and talented Minji was at a young age. The rest of the trainees were too old or needed more polishing before debut.
She then opened her own auditions to search for the rest of the members that could join Minji in debut. She claimed that Source Music’s branding was poor, and the cream of the crop would not be attracted to join, even with GFRIEND in the label. At that time, the press used her to advertise the project, calling it “Min Hee Jin’s girl group.” She used that as leverage to convince more trainees to audition.
There was a problem with the process of picking trainees to begin with. I don’t know why everyone has been blaming me for their disbandment. I have nothing to do with it. I’m someone who is only concerned about my own job. Anyway out of the trainees that Source Music already had, there wasn’t much I could choose from. There was only Minji. I’m sorry to say this but I couldn’t make a selection because they were either too old or they needed to polish their skills more, or they didn’t really suit me. Anyway, so I thought that Minji [had potential] because she was young then, and would get much better with practice. And Minji was really pretty when she was young, way prettier than now. So I thought I would be able to do something (create a group) with her. Anyway so I had to do casting again. I’m sorry to the group but the label’s branding was so bad, so people wouldn’t apply to audition because of GFRIEND. And this was before HYBE was created as a multi-label. The first thing we used to brand the project was “Min Hee Jin’s girl group.” People would be curious because I came from SM Entertainment and I was collaborating with them.
— Min Hee Jin
They created the branding for PLUS auditions as such. As soon as she saw Hanni, she took her in as she was adorable and talented. With Hanni secured, Min Hee Jin continued casting using the brand “Min Hee Jin’s HYBE girl group,” and this helped bring in the rest of the members.
News is being updated as the press conference goes on in real time. Stay tuned for more details on the matter.
You can read more about the original accusations about her role in GFRIEND’s disbandment below. The accusations are from fans who made inferences due to the timeline of which she left Source Music.
