Hello!

I am here once again with another blog entry, this time this will be about Komca stickers and Kpop items from non-Korean press! Komca stickers always have been a mystery for many people and there's no real valid source about them. I have made assumptions about the difference about C1, C2 and C3 stickers and have contacted a reliable source (mwave) to confirm those assumptions, which revealed to be accurate!

Items with Komca Stickers

Items with Komca stickers will ONLY be Korean press items. If your item does not have a Komca sticker do not fear! (It may be a japanese press album for instance) The Komca sticker is used to prove the Korean authenticity of the album, only Korean press items will use the Komca sticker, so Taiwanese, Japanese, Thai etc. won't have that famous Komca sticker. The Komca sticker will prove the authenticity of the album (but not necessarily the CD itself, I am unsure, but imagine the album is sold unsealed and that the person is bad enough, he may switch the CD inside and trade it with a bootleg, I believe this something that may happen if you purchase from an unsealed album from a Chinese seller as there are many bootlegs produced in China....), so it proves the authenticity of the packaging! However, even if the item is a korean press one, it may not always have a komca sticker, that is usually the case for DVDs, as it seems they tend to give more komca stickers to cd albums. HOWEVER, some cd albums may come without any komca sticker, this is the case for The Ark's "The Light" single album, which comes with no Komca sticker. So you must look through unboxing videos or pictures of the album you own that has no komca sticker and see whether other people have it. If nobody has the komca sticker, then you're all good! But if everyone has the komca sticker, that yours doesn't, and it states it is a korean press "made in KOREA", then it would be probable it is not an authentic album.

But...! There are different stickers that exist: the legendary silver sticker "비매 (Bimae)" with along the side a "NOT FOR SALE" sticker (or the "Not for sale" could be directly be printed onto the album) - no barcodes exist for such albums! Those stickers are made for the press, given to the staff of broadcast stations or are used during a giveaway or something along the lines, basically used when those are gifts!

Then we have the golden sticker, but there are actually several, not just the C1 sticker! The number following the C indicates the number of discs inside the packaging. Hence, normal albums usually have 1 disc, but special edition albums (such as repackage albums) may have several discs, or DVD packages of concerts (or whatever) that may have 2-3 discs. So If the item has 2 discs inside, it will have a C2 sticker, if it has 3discs, it will have a C3 sticker. But not all DVD packages may have a Komca sticker, it really depends on whether the company wants it or not, so it's very tricky! For instance for BTS's DVD, some DVDs have the C3 sticker and some don't, for instance NOW BTS in Thailand doesn't have a Komca sticker, and BTS MEMORIES OF 2014 has one. So it's just.... very odd!

The lettering's color of the C1 sticker's number will be adapted to the album's esthetic, as we can see the yellow lettering for the yellow one, or a blue lettering for the blue albums, gray lettering for a gray album, black lettering for a black album and so on. There is no place that exists to check whether the code of the Komca sticker does suit its album.

I have contacted mwave and what said above is correct, here is their answer:

“Dear Customer, Hello this is Mwave. Thank you for inquiry. Komca Sticker C1,C2,C3 means, the number of CDs If you have one CD, you will get C1. for two cds, you will get C2 attached on the back of the album. and so on. Please let us know for further questions. Best. Mwave.

However, this rule seems to be NOT always applied, I have seen that the BTS DVD ON STAGE has a C1 sticker yet it has 3discs, which is very odd. Hence I have contacted btsofficialshop's Q&A concerning this issue (Detective Lassy here!), but it may be that some companies have used the wrong sticker (so no fretting!). You just have to check whether this mistake was applied to every other same items. But in general the rule stated by Mwave is true. So technically, the rule is applied majority of times, but I believe if your album was suppose to have a C2/C3, and it has a C1, it could be because the company doesn't have enough C2/C3 stickers (C1 stickers are more produced than the two others) and they have put a C1. Like mass production of an album could result in shortage of the C2/C3 sticker and the companies just use whatever they have left on their hands.





As you may see circled in different colors, there are 2 discs each time, and all those packages have the C2 sticker, which does respect the rule.




Here we have the C3 sticker, the first example I couldn't see the part where it stated the contents, however we can surely guess that there are 3 discs in it. As or the last example, it could have been tricky as we would say "hey but it says disc 1 and disc 2, where is the third one?" well the third one comes from CD1, so basically the DVD1, DVD2 and CD1 make 3discs, we got the good count!

There, I hope the mystery about Komca stickers has been resolved to some of you. The pictures taken do not belong to me, they were taken from eBay and belong to their rightful owner and were just used as examples.

Items with no Komca Stickers

Anything that is not Korean press will NOT have a Komca sticker, whether it is a japanese, taiwanese, thai or any sort of press.  Japanese albums usually come as jewel case CD containers unless they are special packages for DVDs, concerts or whatever. But Japanese albums just for music are usually jewel cases. I have taken some pictures of Japanese CDs I own and circled the area where it states it was produced in Japan. Most of the information is written at the back of the album, and it could be located at the bottom, the right side, or any corner basically. Usually it also comes (when sealed) with a small paper that was inserted on the left corner of the jewel case (the opposite side of where we open), and that info is once again there, but we usually throw away that paper of course.

The fact is there are several albums out there that are produced with different countries press, and they can look totally the same. For instance, the album Mad horizontal version by Got7 looks almost the same Korean press or Taiwanese press (the Thai press is different, the size of the album is more squarish). So you'd have to look into details to spot which press it comes from. As a result, many people without knowing which press they purchased may think they purchased a non authentic copy as there's no komca sticker. 

The two albums look almost the same right? Without comparing we wouldn't really know what is different. Here the bar code's location is different. But the most important element is the lower part where it states where it was printed. Sadly the pictures I provided are not of the best quality for smaller details (First picture Korean press is my album- sadly my phone doesn't want to cooperate to take better pictures, and the second picture comes from eBay, and it was the only seller that posted a clear enough image). On the Korean press, it states that it printed in KOREA, for the Taiwanese it states it printed in Taiwan. We also have the different labels, which is Kt music in Korea and Universal for Taiwan. We can also spot on the Taiwanese version a Chinese version of the song. So with all those elements, you can see which country's press this belongs! Do not scream "FAKE" because it doesn't have a Komca sticker without analyzing your album.

Now onto this Korean vs Thai press. I pick once again another Got7 album as JYP seems to produce different countries' press while keeping the same layout. Indeed the cover in many cases looks the same, just the back has some different details. As you can see, it says printed in KOREA for the Korean one and printed in Thailand for the Thai one. There's also the difference of labels, Kt music for instance for the Korean one,  and another one for the Thai one (sadly cannot see clearly because of image quality...), the bar code however is located at the same area. The Thai one has extra elements, it has a DVD as well, with a "Just Thailand special" as well that shows us once again that it is a Thai press (the two pictures do not belong to me, the Korean press comes from eBay, and the Thai one comes from a website found on google: boomerangshop). Of course the Korean press has the Komca sticker whilst the Thai press doesn't. So with all the details you can spot which press your album may come from.

I have only stated three different countries press: Japanese, Taiwanese and Thai presses, but I am sure there are other presses (such as Chinese, Hong Kong, perhaps Vietnamese or other Asian countries? Perhaps I will do more research and add those another day), but I have only thought of these ones on the spot. The most common non-Korean presses are the Japanese and Taiwanese presses as there is a large Kpop market over there, Thai press seems to be especially done by JYP.

Thank you for reading this, and I hope this blog entry was informative! Since there are no sources explaining about Komca stickers and other countries press albums, I hope this will be useful to the community.