Cup Ice Leads Sales
Pour-over Style with Water and Coffee Proves Popular
K-ready Meals Like Sotteok Sotteok, Gimbap, and Chicken Skewers Also Rank High
Second CU Store in Hawaii Opens This Month
BGF Retail announced on the 26th that an analysis of 100 days of sales data from the “CU Downtown” store in Hawaii, which the convenience store chain CU opened in November last year as the first in the industry to enter Hawaii, showed that K-products such as cup ice ranked among the top in sales.
Located in the main office district of Downtown, the largest central business district in Honolulu, the CU Downtown store drew strong interest by surpassing 2,000 customers per day in its early days, and it is still visited by around 1,000 customers a day on average, including local office workers and tourists.
Locals and tourists are browsing merchandise at the CU Downtown store in Hawaii. Provided by BGF Retail
The top-selling product at this store is cup ice, which also ranks first in total annual sales at convenience stores in Korea. As it has become popular among locals to pour various beverages such as bottled water, juice, and coffee over cup ice, up to around 1,000 units are sold per day.
CU’s iced drink “Delape,” known as a perfect pairing with cup ice, is also highly popular, with total daily sales reaching up to about 1,500 units. Among them, the product most frequently chosen by customers in Hawaii is “Delape Peach Iced Tea,” which currently ranks in the top 10 in sales.
Other K-ready-to-eat items such as Sotteok Sotteok (2nd), Chicken Skewer (5th), and Potato Hot Dog (8th), as well as K-ready meals such as Beef Bulgogi Gimbap (3rd), Grilled Salmon Triangle Gimbap (7th), and Tuna Mayo Triangle Gimbap (9th), all made it into the top 10. The company analyzed that, in Hawaii where dining-out costs are high, CU has established itself as a food-focused convenience store where customers can get a full meal.
CU’s own differentiated products are also gaining popularity locally. “Fresh Lemon Highball” (4th), an RTD (ready-to-drink) highball that became the biggest hit among convenience store products in 2024, and “Yonsei Milk Fresh Cream Bread” (6th), which sparked a cream bread craze at convenience stores, both ranked in the top 10 in sales.
BGF Retail is accelerating the expansion of its business in Hawaii by opening its second store, “CU Kahala,” on the 25th of this month. Choi Youngju, Head of Overseas Business Planning at BGF Retail, said, “Going forward, we will continue to strengthen our competitiveness in food offerings and our locally tailored strategies based on operating data, in order to become the most trusted convenience store brand in Hawaii.”
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