‘The True Taste Continued for a Thousand Years’ Yeongdeok Snow Crab Achieves Korea Representative Brand Award Triumph

Outstanding Recognition and Trust in the Seafood Sector with 10 Consecutive Grand Prizes

Yeongdeok Snow Crab, a representative specialty of Yeongdeok-gun, Gyeongbuk, won the grand prize in the seafood brand category at the ‘2023 Korea Representative Brand Awards’ ceremony held at the Shilla Hotel on the 18th, achieving a total of 10 awards in this category.

Yeongdeok Snow Crab won the Grand Prize in the seafood category at the 2023 Korea Representative Brand Awards.

Sponsored by Dong-A Ilbo and Korea Economic Daily and organized by the selection committee, the ‘Korea Representative Brand Awards’ is the most prestigious domestic brand award established in 2006 to identify the best brands loved and popular among consumers and to widely promote them to the public.

The selection committee determines the winners through over 4 million professional surveys, including preliminary research on sales and market share of each brand by category, as well as consumer awareness metrics such as initial recall, auxiliary recognition, brand differentiation, trustworthiness, leadership, quality, and loyalty, to ensure fair and objective brand evaluation.

Since first winning the grand prize in 2012, Yeongdeok Snow Crab has claimed the top spot a total of 10 times in 2013, 2015?2019, and 2021?2023, proving itself as an unrivaled brand in the seafood category.

Snow crabs living in the clean seas of the Yeongdeok region inhabit only clean sandy bottoms without any mud, making their taste milder and their shells thinner with more meat compared to snow crabs from other regions. Historically, they have been renowned as a delicacy presented to kings.

Since registering the trademark ‘Yeongdeok Snow Crab’ in 1998, the county has continuously promoted and marketed the brand by holding the annual Yeongdeok Snow Crab Festival, increasing its recognition.

Additionally, efforts to maintain quality and manage fishing grounds have been made in collaboration with the Snow Crab Fishermen’s Association, and the establishment of the nation’s first quality certification system with the Shipowners’ Association has steadily enhanced consumer trust through quality control.

For systematic resource restoration, from 2015 to 2020, a budget of 7.2 billion KRW was invested in the East Sea Snow Crab Resource Recovery Project, which included installing snow crab nursery grounds and creating habitats and spawning grounds. Since 2021, an annual budget of 1 billion KRW has been allocated to continue this project.

Moreover, the 56-ton multipurpose fishery patrol vessel Yeongdeok Nuri-ho was constructed to crack down on illegal fishing, demonstrating round-the-clock efforts to protect snow crab resources.

Thanks to these efforts, Yeongdeok Snow Crab gained attention when it was served at the G20 Summit dinner in 2010, ranked first in the specialty product category in a 2011 awareness survey of 151 cities and counties by the Rural Development Administration, and was exhibited as Korea’s representative seafood at the 2018 Pyeongchang Winter Olympics, attracting global attention.

County Governor Kim Gwang-yeol expressed pride, saying, “Yeongdeok uses the Chinese characters for ‘full’ (盈) and ‘virtue’ (德), meaning ‘full of good virtue.’ Blessed with a pristine and suitable environment, many high-quality specialty products are produced here, but Yeongdeok Snow Crab is undoubtedly the finest among them.”

Governor Kim added, “As Yeongdeok Snow Crab lives up to its reputation as Korea’s top seafood brand, we will devote our efforts to thorough management and protection, driving income growth for residents and regional economic development internally, and ensuring it remains a special and precious seafood loved by the nation for a long time.”

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