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The story
A debate has erupted on 5ch over Up-Front’s “no overreaching” management policy for Hello! Project. Even as Juice=Juice keeps selling out its solo shows, other groups like ANGERME and Tsubaki Factory are reportedly leaving seats empty at their own large-venue shows, fueling fan frustration that popularity and venue size just aren’t matching up. The backdrop: Up-Front has long championed a “sustainable Hello! Project,” deliberately avoiding rapid scale-ups. Thread opinion is split on whether this caution is sound management or simply a failure to invest in a group that’s actually popular.
What people said
Funny, since they push ANGERME and Tsubaki Factory way past their limits without a second thought.
If "not overreaching" is really the policy, shouldn't they just stop keeping every group besides Juice=Juice alive?
But the other Hello! Project groups' tours aren't even selling out — isn't that the real overreach?
You guys keep saying "they could do it, definitely could," but that's reckless talk.
Management is thinking about what comes after. Pull it off and you're left with a mountain of debt. Then what?
Maybe just build up enough popularity that debt isn't an issue?
No dangerous moves, don't get swept up by short-term temptation.
Even if you grab huge glory this year, the backlash could sink you next year. Can't have that.
They're aiming for a "sustainable Hello! Project."
Tickets for the other Hello! Project groups' shows are going unsold though — isn't Hello! Project already taking way too many risks?
They will NOT pull some hyped-up, go-for-it scheme like you naive kids want. Not gonna happen. No way.
Up-Front is the "adult" here. Safety first. Guaranteed survival. Boring is just fine.
Tickets for the other Hello! Project groups are going unsold, so it's not actually "safe" right now.
It'd be safer to scale their tours down until they're selling out every show like Juice=Juice does.
If we bought way more, would we actually get to see the members on a bigger stage?
For Juice=Juice specifically, handshake-event CD sales have already hit their cap, and the live Blu-rays would definitely sell if they were actually promoted — the real problem is Up-Front has zero interest in selling Juice=Juice's releases.
"Go go go! Now's the chance! Hype it up, hype it up, all the way!" — but
this agency is the exact opposite. It's "careful, careful" here. No overreaching. They don't even want a Dome!
The other Hello! Project groups' tickets aren't selling, so if anything they should be even MORE careful.
Let's bring it down. Calm down. Hit pause on the hype train for a second. Get a grip.
With all these lottery losses going around, blood pressure's already dropping.
Honestly, the "wolves" (slang for antagonistic fans trying to kill the hype) are working overtime.
The agency's always sensible.
Even though [Juice=Juice] is more popular than Morning Musume was back then.
When was the last time they even did one, again?
Up-Front can give ANGERME — a group with basically zero popularity — a half-empty hall tour, so even if Juice=Juice's popularity has supposedly already faded, they could at least throw them an ANGERME-level tour.
Well, of course there's no buzz when they've been neglected this hard.
They keep shuffling them off to outside gigs and giving up on actually producing new work for them.
Is there even a single group in Hello! Project that DOES have drawing power?
Come on, time to face reality.
Juice=Juice is the only one selling out shows without padded "sword" tickets (5ch slang implying tickets propped up via bundling or resale schemes).
Both Morning Musume and ANGERME pull the seniority card to keep Juice=Juice out of the big halls, then turn around and pad their own numbers with "sword" tickets anyway.
ANGERME's been running a half-empty-hall festival every single day except opening night.
Hello! Project is built for skimming along just above the ground, not flying that high.
And how many tens of thousands of meters are =LOVE and Kawaii Lab flying at, then?
The other Hello! Project groups keep putting on half-empty shows one after another, so they're definitely not "skimming the ground" either.
Exactly why right now is the limit.
Scale it up and it'll go half-empty too.
There are already six Hello! Project groups running half-empty tours like it's totally normal, so why not let Juice=Juice run a tour big enough to go half-empty too?
Morning Musume and ANGERME get away with it, so it's fine either way.
In the idol world, what matters is how big a venue you played, not whether you actually filled it.
Then just leave Hello! Project, drop the name and the songs, and go do their own thing.
When groups that can't draw like Juice=Juice can get booked into venues bigger than Juice=Juice's and leave them half-empty, of course people are going to be unhappy about that.
So go solo, then. You're unhappy, right?
There's no reason a group that sells out every single show should be the one to leave.
If anything, the agency would do everything it could to keep hold of them.
If they're free to transfer agencies, I wish they'd hurry up and do it.
Hello! Project is seriously just getting in the way at this point.
Background and Key Points of This Debate
Up-Front, which runs Hello! Project, has long preached a policy of avoiding reckless scale-ups in favor of “sustainability,” and this thread shows fans split over how to judge that management stance. There are two main points of contention. First, with Juice=Juice continuing to sell out its solo shows while other groups like ANGERME and Tsubaki Factory leave tickets unsold at large venues, is the allocation of venue size to match popularity actually fair? Second, posters point to Morning Musume’s past arena tour (referenced in the thread as having “burned” the agency) as the basis for its current caution, but the thread never explains specifically when or which tour this was or what went wrong, making it hard for readers unfamiliar with the history to follow. The disagreement is also rooted in a values clash unique to the idol industry — whether “selling out” or “scaling up” should take priority.
*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (Hello! Project) thread “Up-Front: “Even if Juice=Juice got more popular than they already are, we have no intention of scaling up their activities beyond what they’re doing now — they’d just end up more popular than we know what to do with”.”
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