Coupang "Employee Mobilization for PB Top Exposure Is Groundless"... Direct Rebuttal to Fair Trade Commission

Costco PB Share 32%
Discriminatory Display of Private Brands in Large Marts
Criticism of Fair Trade Commission's Regulatory Approach

Coupang on the 23rd strongly refuted the Fair Trade Commission's judgment that it unfairly favored its private brand (PB) products.

This is a direct response to Fair Trade Commissioner Han Ki-jung's statement on the 21st during an appearance on KBS Sunday Diagnosis, where he said, "We plan to address Coupang's act of having employees write reviews for its PB products to boost their search rankings, a form of self-preferential treatment, at the upcoming plenary meeting."

On the same day, Coupang pointed out through its newsroom that the Fair Trade Commission's regulatory approach itself is flawed. Coupang stated, "The Fair Trade Commission criticizes showing consumers the products they want most first as 'algorithm manipulation' in this case," adding, "Displaying products in the way customers want is the essence of distribution and is operated identically by all distributors, both online and offline." It emphasized, "No country in the world regulates this fundamental aspect of distributors."

Coupang Headquarters, Songpa-gu, Seoul. Photo by Jinhyung Kang aymsdream@

Coupang also rebutted the Fair Trade Commission's view that PB products were exposed at the top of search rankings through employee reviews as completely untrue. It explained that all products sold on Coupang are displayed based on a comprehensive reflection of product reviews, sales volume, customer preferences, and product information completeness. Regarding the Fair Trade Commission's claim that employees were mobilized as testers, Coupang said, "90% of Coupang PB manufacturers are small and medium-sized enterprises," and added, "To introduce excellent small and medium-sized enterprises' PB products that struggle to survive due to market dominance by large corporations, we operate the Coupang tester program fairly and legally through voluntary participation of customers and employees, and we clearly notify customers of this."

Coupang also flatly denied the Fair Trade Commission's claim that it earned huge profits by preferentially promoting its PB products. Coupang stated, "We have absorbed losses exceeding 1.2 trillion won over the past five years to support small and medium-sized enterprises that manufacture excellent PB products and to provide better discount benefits to customers," adding, "We do not make money from PB products; rather, losses have increased due to support for small and medium-sized manufacturers and suppliers."

Coupang argued that regulating only Coupang PB product displays is a clear case of reverse discrimination, as most large supermarkets display popular PB products in so-called 'golden zone' shelves with high sales contribution. Coupang said, "The sales proportion of our PB products is only 5% of the total," and added, "This is lower compared to large supermarkets such as Costco (32%), E-Mart (20%), and Lotte Mart (15%)."

The Fair Trade Commission is currently investigating allegations of preferential exposure of Coupang's PB products following a report by the People's Solidarity for Participatory Democracy in 2022. Coupang plans to actively clarify the facts disclosed in its newsroom at the upcoming plenary meeting.