SSG.com, Department Store Food Hall Sales Double in One Month Amid COVID-19

[Asia Economy Reporter Cha Min-young] As the COVID-19 pandemic prolongs, leading to increased remote work and delayed school openings, the time spent at home has expanded, resulting in a rise in demand for premium food ingredients.

SSG.com announced on the 19th that sales of its newly established "Department Store Food Hall" in January doubled within a month.

The Department Store Food Hall is a service that selects premium products available at Korea's five major department stores, including Shinsegae Department Store, and offers them through SSG Delivery and Dawn Delivery.

Analyzing the sales composition of the Department Store Food Hall, SSG.com found that fresh products accounted for 75% and processed products 25%, with fresh product sales overwhelmingly dominant. Among these, meat accounted for 25% and fruit 22%, making up about half of total sales.

The highest-selling product currently in the Department Store Food Hall is the "Premium High-Sugar Banana." Although about 1.7 times more expensive than "regular bananas," premium banana sales nearly reached half of regular banana sales. Fruits that are easy to eat, such as "high-sugar Bullocho mandarins" with 12.5 Brix or higher, which make up about 5% of total mandarin production, and "high-sugar strawberries" with excellent sweetness and flavor, also showed high sales.

Among meat products, "Hanwoo beef tenderloin for grilling" selected from cows under 60 months old, and "antibiotic-free Hanwoo sirloin steak" and "antibiotic-free Hanwoo tenderloin steak" raised healthily ranked high in sales. In particular, premium demand was confirmed to be high when looking for grilling products.

Currently, SSG.com sells about 900 products, including 500 fresh products and 400 processed products, and plans to expand the number of products to about 1,000 by the end of this month, supported by strong consumer response.

Choi Taek-won, Head of Sales at SSG.com, said, "The consumer trend of increasing online sales of fashion and beauty luxury goods every year is similarly appearing in food products," adding, "It seems that there is also an intention to maximize self-satisfaction by paying an additional 'expectation cost' for premium food ingredients whose taste and quality are clearly guaranteed."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.