CU Selects ‘S.T.A.N.D’ as This Year’s Convenience Store Keyword

On the 3rd, CU selected 'S.T.A.N.D' as the keyword that will lead the mega trend in the convenience store market this year.

[Asia Economy Reporter Lim Chun-han] CU announced on the 3rd that it has selected ‘S.T.A.N.D’ as the keyword to lead the mega trends in the convenience store market this year. ‘S.T.A.N.D’ stands for ▲Strengthening differentiated products (Special) ▲Retail tech innovation (Technology) ▲Expansion of overseas business (Abroad) ▲Role as an eco-friendly platform (Nature) ▲Improvement of customer accessibility (Direct).

Following Gomyangmal beer, vegetarian ready meals, and ultra-low price special item series, CU plans to actively develop differentiated new products tailored to the latest consumer trends this year as well, enhancing store competitiveness amid fierce product competition in the convenience store industry. It will focus on improving the quality and expanding the lineup of private brand (PB) products, and also strengthen the product power of home meal replacement (HMR) items, which have recently seen increased demand.

Retail tech will also be actively introduced to develop a new convenience store model. Recently, CU has been collaborating with the Korea Internet & Security Agency and others to develop a fully unmanned convenience store model, and is continuously promoting the introduction of advanced information and communication technology (ICT) stores. This year, CU will utilize membership-based big data to provide customized shopping information to customers and focus on enhancing practical convenience and benefits by collaborating with startups.

Efforts will also be made to expand overseas business. As the businesses in Mongolia and Malaysia grow steadily, CU will accelerate additional expansion into other countries based on business agreements made last year with POSCO International. Currently, CU operates about 150 stores in Mongolia and about 30 stores in Malaysia.

The role as an eco-friendly platform will also be expanded. This year, CU will continue to introduce products made from eco-friendly materials in cooperation with partners, while conducting environmental protection campaigns at more than 15,000 stores nationwide to promote resource recycling and greenhouse gas reduction, and actively implement its eco-friendly roadmap.

CU will expand its scope from offline to online to enhance O2O (Online to Offline) accessibility. To this end, it has established an ‘Online Biz Lab’ organization and plans to build a convenience store e-commerce model to strengthen the connection between online and offline channels.

BGF Retail President Lee Geon-jun said, “As convenience store sales surpassed those of department stores and large marts last year, raising their status, CU will continue to be at the forefront of leading the latest trends in the distribution industry this year.” He added, “As the leading brand in the industry, we will systematically execute a customer-centric super-gap strategy in line with the convenience store keyword ‘S.T.A.N.D’ for the Year of the Black Tiger.”

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