A photo of Shin Dong-won (C), CEO of South Korean instant noodle giant Nongshim Co., looking around the company’s factory in the United States, provided by the company on July 13, 2023.
SEOUL, July 13 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea’s top instant noodle maker, Nongshim Co., said Thursday it aims to triple its sales in the United States by 2030 to top the U.S. instant noodle market.
“Nongshim will boost annual sales to US$1.5 billion, threefold of the current level, by 2030 and top the U.S. ramyeon market,” Shin Dong-won, CEO of Nongshim, said in an email to the company’s executives and employees, marking his second year in office, according to the company.
Nongshim raised $490 million in sales in North America last year, up almost two times from $225 million in 2018.
To achieve the goal, Nongshim said it plans to start building a new factory in the U.S. as early as 2025.
The company currently operates two factories in the state of California.
According to market research firm Euromonitor, Nongshim’s U.S. market share stood at 25.2 percent, in second place, in 2021, trailing after Japan’s Toyo Suisan with 47.7 percent of the market share.
Nongshim said the demand in the U.S. exceeded its production capacity in the country in 2021 due to the popularity of its products during the pandemic.
Nongshim’s products has gained wide attention after the appearance of Chapaguri — a combination of Chapagetti, instant black bean noodles, and Neoguri, Korean udon-like noodles — in the Oscar-winning South Korean film “Parasite,” according to the company.
In 2020, Shin Black Noodle Soup, the premium version of Nongshim’s flagship noodle Shin Ramyun, was named as the world’s best instant noodles by The New York Times.
Back in 2017, Nongshim became the first South Korean food brand to enter all Walmart stores across the U.S.
For future growth, Nongshim has also been pushing for new businesses in smart farms, vegan foods and health functional foods.
(Yonhap)
