"CJ Freshway Strengthens Salad Product Line, Signs Business Agreement with Sweet Balance"

Park Sun-ho, Head of Product Division at CJ Freshway (right), and Jang Ji-man, Co-CEO of Sweet Balance, are posing for a commemorative photo after signing a business agreement on the 16th.

[Asia Economy Reporter Eunmo Koo] CJ Freshway announced on the 20th that it signed a business agreement with salad specialty company Sweet Balance on the 16th for the supply of salad ingredients and joint product development. The plan is to strengthen competitiveness in the salad market, which has grown to the 10 trillion won level, and to expand the salad product line in line with rapidly changing food culture trends.

Sweet Balance is the No. 1 salad manufacturer in Korea, with a monthly shipment volume reaching 1 million units. Since early this year, CJ Freshway has been supplying various salad ingredients to Sweet Balance and applying Sweet Balance salads to group meal menus, establishing a cooperative relationship.

With this business agreement as a turning point, the two companies plan to continue cooperation in various fields from purchasing salad ingredients to developing new products. First, they will promote differentiated salad development based on CJ Freshway's product manufacturing and sourcing infrastructure and Sweet Balance's research and development (R&D) technology. Starting with salads, they plan to gradually expand the product line to include convenience foods and health functional foods. As early as the second half of the year, CJ Freshway-exclusive salads and vegan concept gimbap will be introduced.

CJ Freshway is expected to maximize synergy effects by handling food ingredient distribution, including overseas ingredient sourcing through its global offices, and providing customized products manufactured by its subsidiaries, the agricultural product preprocessing company ‘J Farms’ and the sauce specialty company ‘Songlim Food.’ Accordingly, the range of salad ingredients supplied to Sweet Balance as well as the Sweet Salad menu within group meal sites will be further expanded. CJ Freshway is also reviewing various measures, including investment, to strengthen its cooperative relationship with Sweet Balance.

A CJ Freshway official said, “We expect to develop highly competitive salad products with Sweet Balance, which has excellent salad manufacturing technology capabilities, and present them to various food ingredient distribution channels and group meal clients,” adding, “We will put more effort into strengthening health food and convenience food product lines in response to the diversification of eating habits in the future.”

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