Seoul Metro Partners with Monster Studio to Produce Animation Featuring 'Bread Barber Shop' Characters

Conveying Messages to Comfort and Support Citizens Weary from Daily Life, Including Self-Employed and Office Workers

[Asia Economy Reporter Jong-il Park] Seoul Metro collaborated with Monster Studio (CEO Ji-hwan Jung) to produce a promotional video featuring the ‘Bread Barber Shop’ characters.

The produced video features the corporation’s characters ‘Ttota’ and ‘Bread Barber Shop’ encouraging citizens weary from daily life. Ttota dances to comfort and cheer the Bread Barber Shop characters who have entrusted themselves to the subway after a tiring day.

The corporation plans to continue its collaboration with Monster Studio and will release a promotional video on subway etiquette in the near future.

The video can be viewed from the 9th onward on digital comprehensive guide maps in stations on Seoul Subway Lines 1 to 4, destination information displays in stations and trains on Line 2, destination information displays inside trains on Line 3, and the media board at Gwanghwamun Station on Line 5.

Bread Barber Shop is an animated series produced by Monster Studio in 2019. It has won awards such as the Grand Prize at the 2nd Convergence Content Contest hosted by CJ E&M and the Grand Prize in the Children and Family category at the Sapporo International Short Film Festival.

Subsequently, seasons 1 and 2 aired on KBS 1TV in 2019 and 2020 respectively, and season 3 aired from December 2021 to April 2022, gaining high recognition.

Bread Barber Shop is also very popular online, with 1.11 million YouTube subscribers and a total of 540 million views.

In 2019, Seoul Metro also made headlines by producing videos to comfort citizens exhausted by COVID-19 and to promote etiquette regarding carrying food on the subway, through a business agreement with Monster Studio.

In particular, the video on food carriage etiquette recorded 500,000 views on the Seoul Metro YouTube channel and 730,000 views on the Bread Barber Shop YouTube channel, gaining great popularity.

Kim Jeong-hwan, Head of Public Relations at Seoul Metro, said, “As COVID blues have emerged as a social issue, we wanted to provide a moment of joy to citizens weary from daily life during their subway rides. We will continue to utilize promotional methods that engage citizens’ interest, such as animation.”