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The Korea Times

By Lee Hae-rin
Kimchi from luxury hotels is selling like hot cakes in South Korea.
Koreans’ daily consumption of premium kimchi, created with recipes from hotel chefs and made with top-notch ingredients, has been rising amid growing demand for packaged kimchi and ingredient price hikes driven by the climate crisis.
According to hotel officials, sales of Supex Kimchi, a high-end kimchi brand from Walkerhill Hotels & Resorts that costs 28,000 won (US$19) per kilogram, increased by 42.2 per cent year on year in October. Walkerhill Hotel Kimchi, which is cheaper, saw its sales jump 109.9 per cent.

Meanwhile, sales of kimchi made by Josun Hotels & Resorts, which also costs 28,000 won per kilogram, increased by 10 per cent in November compared to the same period in 2023.
Lotte Hotels & Resorts, which started its kimchi business in August 2023, saw its kimchi sales jump by 50 per cent in October compared to 2023.
Premium kimchi made by luxury hotels is two to three times more expensive than regular kimchi.
Nevertheless, Korean consumers who eat kimchi every day are becoming more willing to open their wallets instead of making kimchi themselves, because of a consumption trend favouring domestic and high-quality ingredients, and ingredient price hikes caused by climate change.
The prices of cabbage and radish, the main ingredients of kimchi, are between 50 and 100 per cent higher than in 2o23. The rise in ingredient prices is due to a reduction in farmland under cultivation because of bad weather and frequent rainfall during the harvest season.

The proportion of Koreans who buy packaged kimchi has nearly tripled over the past three years, to more than three in every 10.
From the hotels’ perspective, the kimchi business has low input costs, as they can use personnel and cooking facilities from existing food and beverage operations.
As most major hotels have affiliate distribution channels such as online shopping malls and TV home shopping, it is easy for them to expand and deliver to sales networks, industry insiders explained.
A hotel industry official said: “Hotel kimchi seems to have [gained the] trust [of] consumers.”
Read the full story at The Korea Times.


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Food & Drink

Created with recipes from hotel chefs and made with top-notch ingredients, premium kimchi in Korea can cost almost US$20 per kilogram


Created with recipes from hotel chefs and made with top-notch ingredients, premium kimchi in Korea can cost almost US$20 per kilogram.


South Korea

Korea Times

Climate change