"I Was Naively Clever"... Soyoung Kim, 'Oh Sangjin's Wife,' Suddenly Shuts Down Book Club

Six Years of the "Chaekbaljeonso Book Club"
Service to End in October

Sangjin Oh and his wife Soyoung Kim. Screenshot from Soyoung Kim's SNS

Soyoung Kim, a former announcer who is now a broadcaster and entrepreneur, opened up about her decision to end the "Chaekbaljeonso Book Club" subscription service, which she has operated for six years.

On September 4th, she announced on her social networking service (SNS), "The Chaekbaljeonso Book Club service will end with the October subscription." It has been six years since she launched the club in 2020 in response to difficulties operating a bookstore during COVID-19, providing curated books directly to subscribers' homes.

Kim explained the reason for closing the business, saying, "There isn't just a single reason," and cited both changes in the market environment and internal circumstances as factors behind the decision. She added, "While I will be wrapping up the book club, moving forward, I will return to being a reader who simply shares the books I am reading."

Kim Soyoung. Kim Soyoung SNS capture

A day later, on September 5th, Soyoung Kim shared her feelings in a longer post, saying, "After a whole day, I realized I had made a very sudden announcement. I have been mentally preparing for the changes in the publishing and printing industry over the past few years, but I never mentioned facing any difficulties. Those who read my announcement yesterday must have been quite surprised."

She continued, "Sometimes I wonder if I should have dropped hints about how hard things were. But I didn't want it to seem like I was being irresponsible or blaming others. I wanted to do my best with a smile until the end, without showing any sign of struggle, and say goodbye cheerfully. I didn't realize it could come as a shock. I learned from this that I was, in a way, naively clever."

Reflecting on her relationship with fans, she said, "With hundreds of thousands of followers, each joined at different times and for different reasons, so it's impossible for everyone to think the same way. Even though this work was precious to me, almost like my own child, I should not have handled it alone and should have shown my feelings more clearly and more often." She then pledged, "Just as we have shared the past ten years together, I will become someone who can share even more stories with those who wish to continue supporting me."

Soyoung Kim also revealed last month that she had wound up her own cookie brand. "Even though we sold a lot, we were in deficit," she explained, adding, "Because we put a lot of care and time into making them, we used a lot of manpower and insisted on high-quality ingredients like Valrhona chocolate."

She will continue to operate her other company, Beplant. Last year, she secured an investment of approximately 7 billion won from Altos Ventures, based on her curation commerce business "Bronte."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.