SEOUL, April 6 (Korea Bizwire) — To better cope with the changing face of the retail market, super supermarket (SSM) chains are strengthening their fresh food sections and launching near-distance delivery services. Homeplus Express, run by South Korean hypermarket chain operator Homeplus Co., transformed about one third of its roughly 300 outlets nationwide to ones [...]
SEOUL, April 1 (Korea Bizwire) — CU has opened its first outlet in Malaysia as part of its overseas push, the operator of South Korea’s top convenience store chain said Thursday. The 165-square-meter outlet started operations at a shopping mall in a middle-class neighborhood in the Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur, according to BGF Retail [...]
SEOUL, March 24 (Korea Bizwire) — KT&G Corp., South Korea’s dominant tobacco company, said Wednesday it is aiming to earn half of its revenue from overseas by 2025 as it seeks to open more overseas subsidiaries and explore new markets. Currently, KT&G earns 40 percent of its tobacco sales from exports. The company operates sales [...]
SEOUL, March 19 (Korea Bizwire) — The number of big-name retailers’ beauty stores in South Korea declined for the first time in 2020 as more customers turned to online shopping amid the coronavirus pandemic, data showed Friday. The country’s three major health and beauty (H&B) chains — Olive Young, lalavla and LOHB’s — had a [...]
SEOUL, March 18 (Korea Bizwire) — Convenience store chain CU recaptured the No. 1 position in South Korea in terms of outlet numbers in 2020, one year after losing the title, data showed Thursday. CU, operated by BGF Retail Co., had 14,923 outlets across the nation as of end-2020, up 1,046 from the previous year [...]
SEOUL, March 16 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea’s top portal operator Naver Corp. and retail giant Shinsegae Group said Tuesday they agreed to a share swap deal valued at 250 billion won (US$221 million) to strengthen their foothold in the highly competitive e-commerce sector. Under the agreement, Naver will buy 150 billion won worth of [...]
SEOUL, March 11 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea’s home-meal replacement product market was estimated at 4.2 trillion won (US$3.68 billion) in 2019, data showed Thursday, with the sector expected to continue to grow down the road on the growing number of single-member households. The annual average growth of the segment was 16 percent since 2010, [...]
SEOUL, March 9 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korean department store chains saw their sales exceed pre-coronavirus levels last weekend. The warm weather of spring, coupled with ongoing vaccinations, is seen to have burst the urge for consumption withheld for the last 12 months. On the weekend of March 5-7, Hyundai Department Store saw a 109.8 [...]
SEOUL, March 4 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea announced Thursday it plans to invest 300 billion won (US$267 million) over the next three years to speed up the growth of the digital retail segment, which has recently enjoyed an unprecedented boom amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Under the plan, the country will not only pave the [...]
SEOUL, March 3 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea’s department stores have seen a spike in sales of cosmetics after the government lifted restrictions on the use of samples. To comply with the government’s infection-control measures, department stores stopped the use of samples within outlets from December 24 last year. Such restrictions, however, were lifted on [...]