K-Pop Band Seventeen's Recipe for Career Longevity: Be Best Friends - Business Insider
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The K-pop mega band Seventeen shows how being best friends with coworkers can lead to lasting careers
By Cheryl Teh
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Seventeen wrapped up their "NEW_" tour in Incheon, South Korea, on Sunday.
April 7, 2026, 6:01 AM GMT+2
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Boy bands breaking up or bleeding group members happens so often that it borders on cliché. But the mega band Seventeen is proving that it's possible for 13 people to work together for 11 years and counting.
On Sunday night, the group gave a three-and-a-half-hour run of some of their greatest hits. At the end of the show, the band's leader S.Coups (Choi Seungcheol) announced that the whole team had decided to re-sign with their label, Pledis Entertainment, which comes under the K-pop giant, Hybe.
The band is one of Hybe's highest-earning groups. Its 2023 album, "FML," holds the record for first-day sales for a K-pop album and netted more than 6.4 million copies sold. In 2025, Seventeen's 10th anniversary album, "Happy Burstday," debuted at No. 2 on the Billboard 200 and sold over 2.52 million copies in its first week.
Speaking as the group's representative, S.Coups — whose real name is Choi Seungcheol — said that the band was about to face "something really important" in the next months, and that he wanted to make an announcement before "Carat Land," their June fan meeting.
"After a lot of deep and sincere conversations among us members, all 13 of us have decided to renew our contracts," he said. "We will continue to sail on the same ship and row forward together."
For the uninitiated: Bands like Seventeen and their peers often sign contracts for a fixed number of years. Seventeen last announced a contract renewal in 2021, and this year is their 11th in the business.
Only nine of the group's 13 members were actively touring due to South Korea's mandatory military service. In the coming years, five more members of the group will have to enlist.
However, Seventeen signing on as a full team once more means the group will likely reunite after every member completes their military service.