As a heat wave with a heat index of around 40 degrees Celsius continues day after day, the convenience store industry is accelerating its summer food marketing. With demand for cool foods such as smoothies, ice cream, and alcohol surging, retailers are launching new products and rolling out large-scale discount events, competing to win over summer customers.
According to the retail industry on the 1st, convenience store chain CU has moved to expand its "Real Smoothie" lineup of freshly made beverages. Using flash-frozen fruit to preserve the taste and nutrition of the raw ingredients, Real Smoothie has surpassed 500,000 cumulative cups sold since its first launch in June last year. Building on this demand, CU recently launched "ABC Smoothie" and "Acai Berry Smoothie" and expanded sales to about 500 stores nationwide, strengthening its push into the summer freshly made smoothie market.
GS25 is targeting the cup beverage market. According to GS25's analysis of sales data for the first half of this year, sales of milk tea products increased 111% from the same period a year earlier. Capturing this trend, GS25 recently launched a new cup beverage, "Yours Royal Milk Tea," to target the growing demand for milk tea.
Emart24 will hold large-scale discount events on beverages and ice cream throughout the month of August. An analysis of sales data over the past three years showed that average August sales of beverages and ice cream increased 12% and 11%, respectively, compared to July, demonstrating the demand. In addition, Emart24 will apply discount events such as 1+1 and 2+1 to all zero-calorie beverage products, and run a promotion offering a 20% discount on purchases of 5,000 won or more with a specific payment method. It will also provide a 40% discount when purchasing two or more of any Häagen-Dazs product.
Seven-Eleven has also strengthened its alcohol discount promotions ahead of the summer peak season. Seven-Eleven is launching "Hoster Premium," a happoshu produced by Damm Brewery, Spain's largest beer maker, while also strengthening discount promotions on a total of 12 bundle products including Cass, Terra, Budweiser, and Hoegaarden.
With the industry expecting the heat wave to continue in full force in August, convenience stores are expected to continue competing for customers during the summer peak season by expanding summer-specialized products and rolling out various discount promotions. "There is a growing trend of continuously expanding data-based product development so that we can present the products customers want as quickly as possible," a convenience store industry official said. "We will strengthen our differentiated competitiveness in food offerings."
