BTS is releasing limited edition hotteok-flavored Oreos - KSL.com

CHICAGO — K-pop group BTS made waves in March with their first concert together in nearly four years. Now the famed boy band is teaming up with Oreo, one of America's most famous cookie brands, for a limited-edition flavor.Limited-edition releases help the more-than-century-old Oreo brand maintain its cultural relevance, and the BTS partnership could help it capitalize on the increasing popularity of Korean pop culture. The collaboration also provides an extra boost to BTS as the band retakes the global stage after the years-long hiatus during which the K-pop landscape saw massive changes.The BTS cookie, on sale June 1, will be filled with a sweet creme that was curated to taste like hotteok, a brown sugar-stuffed pancake popular in South Korea, which the seven band members ate growing up, according to a press release.Their cookie wafer will be purple, a nod to the color associated with BTS and its fanbase, known as ARMY. The wafers are engraved with one of 13 designs, three of which spell out a message to fans when put together, as well as a design with the seven band members' names — RM, Jin, Suga, J-Hope, Jimin, V and Jung Kook, another with a BTS light stick and more.The crossover with BTS is "much bigger than a U.S. activation," said Matt Foley, Oreo's vice president of marketing.BTS's cookies will be sold in more than 80 countries, according to the company. That's more than the four non-U.S. countries where Selena Gomez's horchata-inspired cookies were made available.Don't call it a comebackBTS, which debuted in 2013, has been on hiatus since 2022 while the members completed mandatory military service in South Korea. The group returned this year with the largest-ever concert in Seoul, South Korea, as part of a promotional tour for their fifth studio album.While the group is still considered a K-pop powerhouse, they now face far more competition as a global K-pop brand — artists like BlackPink, Stray Kids, Ateez, Twice and others are now also vying for the attention (and money) of fans worldwide.For its part, Oreo is facing the same economic concerns as other consumer brands. A jump in gas prices and years of inflation have dampened Americans' outlook. And inflation is now running so hot that it's eclipsed Americans' paycheck gains.But Oreo remains one of Mondelēz International's biggest brands, topping $4 billion in sales in 2023. That's partly because it positioned itself as an affordable indulgence.Even so, Mondelēz has sought to keep Ore