Frightening Prices... It's Advantageous to Buy This Chuseok Gift Early

[Asia Economy Reporter Yuri Kim] Ahead of Chuseok, concerns over 'agflation (agriculture + inflation)' are rising, prompting the distribution industry to launch 'pre-order marketing' for Chuseok gifts. As prices of agricultural and livestock products are expected to peak around Chuseok, retailers are competing to secure gift demand by emphasizing that customers can buy up to 70% cheaper than the current market price (normal price) by ordering early.

◆ "Reserve your Chuseok gifts before prices rise further"

Emart announced on the 9th that it selected four representative fruit gift sets as 'Limited Deal' products and will sell 30,000 sets at up to 30% cheaper than market prices. They will offer 10,000 sets of sugar-selected apples and pears, and 4,000 sets of Shine Muscat + melon at discounted prices. Lotte Mart expanded its pre-order items by about 20% compared to last year, preparing a total of around 900 items. Due to the non-face-to-face period, gift prices are expected to rise compared to the average year, so premium gift sets were increased by about 15% compared to last year.

AK Plaza will run pre-order sales of Chuseok gift sets with a variety of product compositions and price ranges, including signature, premium, and practical sets, until the 2nd of next month. Lotte Department Store will sell about 200 items until the 26th, including 68 types of fresh foods such as livestock, fruits, and seafood, about 60 health foods, about 10 alcoholic beverages, and 60 processed foods. Shinsegae Department Store will start pre-sales of a total of 350 items, increasing about 60 items compared to last year's Chuseok, until the 3rd of next month. Hyundai Department Store also expects an increase in non-face-to-face gift demand and expanded the total number of items by 20% compared to last year.

◆ "With rapid price increases, the earlier you buy, the better"

With bird flu (AI) and heatwaves already causing price fluctuations, there are concerns that prices for Chuseok, about 40 days away, will rise even higher. In this situation, gift sets offered at discounted prices compared to current market prices are attractive, according to each company. From the distribution industry's perspective, as the proportion of pre-order sales has grown to nearly half of total sales, securing sales before the impact of the mutual aid national support fund (disaster relief fund) is important, so they are competitively releasing pre-order products with diversified prices and items.

Last year, Lotte Department Store's pre-order sales of Chuseok gift sets increased by 26.9% compared to the same period the previous year. Emart also saw a 25.7% increase in pre-order sales of fruit gift sets for last year's Chuseok compared to the previous year. Emart predicts that this trend will continue this Chuseok, with pre-orders for fruit gift sets expected to grow by the double digits. In particular, trend sets including Shine Muscat are targeting more than double growth this year.

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