(image: Yonhap)
SEOUL, Dec. 24 (Korea Bizwire) — Franchisees on average shuttered their businesses in just over four years, government data showed Monday, in the latest sign of troubles facing small entrepreneurs.
The 2015 data compiled by Statistics Korea showed that franchisees ran their stores for 52 months before closing them.
By sector, franchisees of pharmaceutical businesses shuttered their shops after operating them for 133.6 months on average, the longest of businesses checked. In comparison, coffee franchisees stayed open just 27 months.
The data revealed that non-franchisees ran their businesses 88.9 months on average before closing their operations.
Among them, coffee shops, which are run by non-franchisees, lasted 43.3 months.
The data underscored the fierce competition among coffee shops — both franchisees and non-franchisees — in a country dominated by Starbucks Coffee.
South Korea’s coffee market stood at 11.7 trillion won (US$10.4 billion) in 2017, up more than threefold from around the middle 3 trillion-won level a decade earlier, according to the Korea Customs Service
This translates into 26.5 billion cups of coffee being served in 2017 and an average of 512 cups being consumed per person in a country with a population of around 51 million.
Starbucks Coffee Korea Co., the local unit of the U.S. giant, has more than 1,140 stores throughout the country and its annual operating profit was estimated at 110 billion won in 2017 on estimated sales of 1.2 trillion won.
(Yonhap)
