Seoul, Wednesday, 22 October 2025.
The World Webtoon Festival transformed Lotte Town Jamsil into an IP‑first destination from Sunday to Wednesday, temporarily repurposing spaces such as the ice rink and adjacent retail to host exhibitions, themed pop‑ups and life‑size props tied to major webtoon franchises. For operators, most striking outcome was commercial: over 1,200 products across 12 companies and several pop‑up stores sold out on the first day, showing how digital‑native IP can drive incremental visitation, on‑site retail and F&B spend. Organisers — including D&C Media, Naver Webtoon and public agencies — navigated spatial reprogramming, mixed‑use crowd flows, rights‑managed supply chains and brand licensing at scale. The festival deepened cross‑sector partnerships and offers a replicable blueprint for turning episodic events into seasonal or permanent guest experiences. Retail and attractions teams should note operational lessons on inventory, queueing and experiential merchandising; consider how platform content can be activated to extend dwell time and monetise fandom.
The World Webtoon Festival staged across Lotte Town Jamsil temporarily reprogrammed mixed‑use precincts — from the Lotte World Ice Rink to adjacent retail and cinema spaces — into themed exhibition zones, pop‑up stores and immersive displays, shifting the complex’s operating model from day‑to‑day retail and attractions activity to an IP‑first event topology over several days [1][2]. The official festival schedule shows an on‑site pop‑up window that extended beyond the four main festival days, underlining how organizers used staggered retail activation to spread visitation across a longer commercial period [2].
Organisers, partners and institutional backing
The event assembled a cross‑sector organising coalition: government cultural agencies co‑hosted the festival while private IP holders and platform companies provided content and brand activation. The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism and the Korea Creative Content Agency were named festival co‑hosts, and major webtoon companies including Naver Webtoon, Daon Creative and D&C Media were reported among the 12 participating firms, signalling a public–private approach to IP export and domestic cultural promotion [1][4].
Commercial outcomes: retail volume, sell‑outs and product depth
Organizers reported substantial retail throughput: over 1,200 products offered across 12 companies, and several pop‑up stores sold out on the festival’s first day — a concrete indicator that digital‑native IP can translate into immediate, high‑margin onsite retail demand when activated with scarcity and event timing [4][1]. Life‑size props and weapon displays tied to series such as Solo Leveling were a visible conversion of intangible IP into high‑impact merchandising that drove both social‑media shareability and queueing behaviour among predominantly younger attendees [1][4].
Operational complexities for park and precinct operators
Temporarily converting attractions spaces into exhibition and retail environments required detailed operational changes: spatial reprogramming of ice‑rink and atrium footprints, integrated crowd‑flow management across transit‑connected mixed‑use assets, and handling rights‑managed product supply chains and licensing at scale — all issues documented in reportage of the festival’s move from a smaller Seongsu‑dong footprint to the larger, more accessible Jamsil complex [1][4]. The venue change was explicitly praised by attendees for improved accessibility, a factor that reduces friction for higher‑value, international visitors [1][4].
Programming and content strategy: episodic to seasonal conversion
The festival illustrates a strategy of turning episodic content activations into repeatable seasonal programming: the event combined themed zones, author talks, live drawing, awards and merchandising to create multiple monetisable touchpoints, while holding the World Webtoon Awards during the festival to anchor earned media and industry attention—an approach that supports converting one‑off attendance peaks into year‑round engagement pipelines for IP holders and destination operators [4][1].
Global reach and cultural diplomacy
Reporting from the festival noted an increased international presence and a global voting element for a Readers’ Choice award, and broader cultural promotion of webtoons was visible in parallel programming overseas — for example, a dedicated webtoon exhibition at the Korean Cultural Centre in Budapest that presented interactive installations and life‑size character displays, underlining how domestic event activations link into a wider diplomatic and cultural export strategy for Korean content [4][3].
Practical takeaways for operators and licensors
For park and attractions professionals, the festival provides a working blueprint: align IP owners and platform operators early on supply, exclusivity and inventory terms; design spatial templates for rapid fit‑out of retail and immersive sets (ice rinks and atria can be re‑skinned without long‑term structural change); and plan crowd‑management that accounts for transit patterns and multi‑day pop‑up windows to maximise dwell time and F&B conversion [1][4]. Attention to licensed product lead‑times is essential where pop‑ups are expected to sell out quickly — the festival’s early sell‑outs show the revenue upside but also the reputational risk of stock shortages [1][4].
Industry implications and replicability
The Lotte Town Jamsil activation demonstrates how destination operators can monetise the globalisation of platform‑native content: by creating tightly timed retail scarcity, experience‑led photo moments and award‑anchored programming, precincts can capture new visitor segments while strengthening licensing revenues and media partnerships. The model is particularly replicable across East Asia, where platform‑to‑destination synergies and multilingual distribution create rapid fan mobilisation, though careful contractual and supply‑chain planning is required to avoid sell‑out‑driven disappointment among international attendees [4][1][3].
Bronnen