Say cheese, again: Why can't Gen Zs get enough of photo booths?

SINGAPORE - From Neoprint stickers in the 2000s to themed self-photo studios today, the humble photo booth keeps coming back, and Gen Z is leading the queue.When Keith Kok visited South Korea in 2022, he found photo booths almost everywhere he turned."Every 50 to 100 steps, I'd see one," says the founder of photo-booth chain Solace Studios, now 25, who ended up visiting one every day of his week-long trip."When I came back to Singapore, I realised there weren't many of these photo booths," he says. "Four years ago, we had only self-photo studios, where you had to make a booking, then you had 15 minutes to take all the shots. It wasn't a walk-in service like the ones in South Korea."At 21, he decided to start his own company offering exactly that. "It was something that I enjoyed doing, so I wanted to let others experience it."It took three months to get the first shop ready, including a month of renovations. Solace customises its booth exteriors in China but sources components such as cameras and printers locally.