Five Guys, Super Duper, Gordon Ramsay, and More Line Up
SPC Group's Shake Shack Opened Fire in 2016
In-N-Out Popup Store Sees 'Open Run' from Dawn
Domestic Burger Market Estimated to Exceed 4 Trillion Won This Year
South Korea is becoming a ‘battleground’ for world-famous burger brands. Overseas burger brands such as Shake Shack, Five Guys, Super Duper, and Gordon Ramsay Burger are gearing up for fierce competition over the domestic burger market, which is worth around 4 trillion won.
On the 31st of last month, at an In-N-Out Burger pop-up store held at a restaurant in Sinsa-dong, Gangnam-gu, Seoul, an employee is holding up the signature Double-Double burger and potato chips. Photo by Moon Hyewon
According to Hanwha Galleria on the 1st, Five Guys, considered one of the ‘Big Three American Burgers,’ will open its first store in South Korea at the end of this month in Gangnam, Seoul.
The intense competition among overseas handmade burger brands in the domestic dining market began in 2016 when SPC Group introduced the American Shake Shack to Korea. When the first store opened near Sinnonhyeon Station in Gangnam, Seoul, it set a record of selling an average of 3,000 to 3,500 burgers per day. Near Sinnonhyeon Station, a remarkable scene unfolded where customers lined up in long queues surrounding the entire store every day as soon as it opened.
Gordon Ramsay Burger, which settled in Lotte World Mall in 2021, sells premium handmade burgers priced at 140,000 won, but it attracted great interest from Korean consumers, with 2,000 people rushing to make advance reservations on the first day of opening within just 30 minutes. Riding on its success, it recently opened a relatively more affordable ‘Gordon Ramsay Street Burger’ in Gangnam COEX, and plans to open its second store in Korea at Shinsegae Department Store Centum City in Busan early next month, outside Seoul and the metropolitan area.
Super Duper, an American handmade burger brand whose first store near Sinnonhyeon Station was opened by bhc Group in November last year, sold more than 20,000 hamburgers within two weeks of opening, and currently sells about 1,400 hamburgers daily on average.
Customers are lining up to enter the In-N-Out Burger pop-up store held on the 31st of last month in Gangnam-gu, Seoul. Photo by Moon Hyewon
In-N-Out Burger, one of the Big Three American burgers, operated a pop-up store in Sinsa-dong, Gangnam-gu, Seoul on the 31st of last month. Although it was originally scheduled to operate temporarily for only four hours from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m., a so-called ‘open run’ phenomenon occurred, with crowds gathering from early dawn well before the opening. As a result, all 500 burgers prepared were sold out by 11:30 a.m., when the store officially opened.
Louis Hernandez, the foreign events manager at the U.S. headquarters, said, "Among Asian countries, In-N-Out has come only to Korea, not Japan or China. Korea is the country of BTS," adding, "There are no plans to open a permanent store yet, but we want to visit more often in the future to meet Korean consumers and let them taste our signature Double-Double burger."
In-N-Out previously held pop-up stores in Korea three times in 2012, 2015, and 2019. Each time, all prepared menu items were sold out, attracting large crowds and forming long lines. After a hiatus due to the impact of COVID-19, the pop-up store was reopened this year after four years. The pop-up store operations are directly managed by the U.S. headquarters, and each opening has sparked speculation about a possible entry into the Korean market.
Recently, as demand for handmade burgers among Korean consumers has grown, the possibility of In-N-Out entering the domestic market has been steadily raised within and outside the industry. According to global market research firm Euromonitor, the domestic burger market size has doubled over nine years from 1.9 trillion won in 2013 to 3.8 trillion won last year, and it is estimated to exceed 4 trillion won this year.
On the 31st of last month, a brand banner was displayed at the In-N-Out Burger pop-up store held at a restaurant in Sinsa-dong, Gangnam-gu, Seoul. Photo by Moon Hyewon
The reason foreign burger brands are consecutively entering the Korean dining market is interpreted as Korea’s rapidly changing dining trends making it a suitable testbed for expansion into Asia.
Additionally, the popularity of Hallyu and K-content, increased overseas travel in the endemic era, and the development of social networking services (SNS) have contributed to Korea being a popular tourist destination where young people, in particular, show high interest in dining brands they have encountered abroad.
Professor Eunhee Lee of Inha University’s Department of Consumer Studies analyzed, "Burgers used to be simply fast food to fill a meal, but now, especially for young consumers, they fulfill their desire to travel abroad. When eating a burger, it creates an illusion that I am in New York or California inside the store, satisfying that feeling."
However, not all brands succeed just by entering the Korean market. Good Stuff Eatery, known as the ‘Obama Burger,’ ambitiously opened near Sinnonhyeon Station in October last year but decided to close within less than six months. Johnny Rockets, an American burger franchise introduced by Shinsegae Food in 2011, also withdrew from the domestic market last year due to changes in domestic dining trends and the impact of COVID-19.
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