"Let's Stop by the Rest Area for Udon and Donkatsu"... Surprised When Trying to Pay

Americano Tops Sales at Rest Areas
Annual Sales Reach 1 to 2 Billion Won

Over the past five years, the foods with the highest price increases at highway rest areas were udon and donkatsu.

Vehicles parked at the highway rest area during the holiday. Photo by Kang Jin-hyung

According to data on price changes of the top 10 best-selling foods at highway rest areas from 2019 to 2024 (based on December of each year) received by Ahn Tae-jun, a member of the National Assembly Land, Infrastructure and Transport Committee from the Korea Expressway Corporation, the average price of udon was 6,619 won last year, showing the highest increase rate of 24.5% compared to 5,315 won in 2019. The price of udon rose annually between 2% and 10%, with 5,476 won in 2020 and 6,251 won in 2022.

The second highest average increase rate was for donkatsu (24.2%). Its price rose from 8,666 won in 2019 to 10,766 won last year, making it the only item among the top 10 best-selling foods to exceed 10,000 won in unit price.

Walnut pastries ranked third, increasing 20.2% from 4,014 won to 4,823 won during the same period.

On the other hand, cafe latte (4,661 won → 5,020 won, 7.7%) and ramen (4,333 won → 4,710 won, 8.7%) showed relatively low increase rates. The Korea Expressway Corporation explained that ramen is designated as a "value product" to suppress price increases, and some rest areas have introduced cooking robots to sell ramen and coffee at affordable prices.

From 2020 through last year, the menu item with the highest sales during the 10 Lunar New Year and Chuseok holiday periods at highway rest areas was Americano. Sales ranged from 1 to 2 billion won each holiday, totaling 19.934 billion won.

Following were walnut pastries (16.91 billion won), udon (11.75 billion won), and rice cake skewers (10.2 billion won), which were especially popular during the holiday periods.

The rest area with the highest sales during last year’s Lunar New Year and Chuseok holidays was Haengdamdo Rest Area on the Seohaean Expressway in Dangjin, Chungnam. It recorded total sales of 2.316 billion won, with 970 million won during Lunar New Year and 1.346 billion won during Chuseok.

The second highest was Deokpyeong Rest Area on the Yeongdong Expressway in Icheon, Gyeonggi Province (1.88 billion won), followed by Siheung Haneul Rest Area on the Capital Region 1st Circular Expressway in Siheung, Gyeonggi Province (1.287 billion won).

Assemblyman Ahn emphasized, "The Korea Expressway Corporation should prepare fundamental measures to lower food prices, such as expanding directly managed rest areas, to ease the burden on citizens using rest areas during this severe high inflation era."

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