HiteJinro Beer Shipment on Second Day... Transported Without Friction
120,000 Boxes Shipped as Scheduled... No Staff Deployed
HiteJinro "Striving for Normal Shipment During Peak Season"
[Asia Economy Reporter Song Seung-yoon] HiteJinro, which resumed shipment of beer products at its factory in Gangwon, is continuing shipments smoothly on the second day as well.
According to HiteJinro on the 9th, as of 10 a.m., about 100 logistics vehicles entered the HiteJinro Gangwon factory in Hongcheon-gun, Gangwon-do, and are sequentially carrying out product shipment operations. HiteJinro plans to ship 120,000 boxes as usual on this day. On the previous day, about 110,000 boxes, which is 92% of the normal level, were shipped. Members of the Cargo Solidarity of the Korean Public Service and Transport Workers' Union under the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions are present at the site, but entry and exit are smooth due to police control. With police cooperation, HiteJinro withheld deploying employees on site today and only essential personnel supported the site.
Earlier, the Gangwon factory of HiteJinro experienced shipment disruptions due to protests by the Cargo Solidarity starting from the 2nd. The Cargo Solidarity occupied and staged sit-ins at the factory entrance using trucks and other vehicles. The Gangwon factory, which produces beer products such as Terra, Hite, Max, and Filite, has the largest production share among HiteJinro's beer factories. However, with the protests starting at the factory entrance, shipments could not be made on the first and second days, the 2nd and 3rd, and shipment rates dropped significantly on the 4th (76%) and 5th (25%) compared to usual. No products were shipped on the weekend of the 6th and 7th either.
HiteJinro deployed about 200 employees from the previous day to resume beer shipments. About six police companies from the Gangwon Provincial Police Agency and Hongcheon Police Station were also deployed at the site the previous day. By securing the access route early, no physical clashes occurred.
The conflict between HiteJinro and the Cargo Solidarity has continued for five months. About 130 truck owners belonging to Suyang Logistics, HiteJinro's contracted freight transport company, joined the Cargo Solidarity under the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions at the end of March and went on strike. Starting with a partial strike in March, they launched a full strike in June, and since the general strike of the Cargo Solidarity, they have continued obstructive actions such as illegally parking trucks near the factory entrances of the Icheon and Cheongju factories or occupying the access roads. They are demanding increases in transportation fees and empty bottle transportation charges, as well as payments for vehicle advertising costs, idling, and waiting times.
HiteJinro is responding by filing civil and criminal lawsuits against those committing illegal acts and actively requesting crackdowns from local governments and the police, but the truck owners' resistance is intensifying. On the 22nd of last month, 29 union members who committed illegal acts during a rally at the Cheongju factory were arrested on the spot, and at the Gangwon factory on the 4th and 5th, union members who blocked logistics vehicle movement and did not comply with dispersal orders were also arrested on the spot. The police applied for arrest warrants for four of them, and two were detained.
HiteJinro estimates that direct losses calculated since the full transport refusal in June amount to about 5 to 6 billion KRW. Considering overall losses including production and sales losses, the damage is estimated to be in the range of 10 billion to nearly 20 billion KRW.
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