Seoul Milk started marking manufacturing dates on milk packages for the first time here.

By Yoon Ja-young

Founded in 1937, Seoul Milk is the leading dairy product manufacturer in the country. The white and green carton of Seoul Milk is what most people think of first here when they think of dairy products.

As the cooperative of dairy farmers in the country, it has focused on supplying quality products over the past 74 years. The keyword here is freshness.

Seoul Milk has been an innovator in the industry, introducing “First Grade A” milk, the “Cold Chain System” and “HACCP,” or Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point, for the first time here. All these innovations aim at supplying fresh and quality dairy products to consumers. Thanks to these efforts, Seoul Milk remains the top player in the industry.

The “First Grade A” milk is the highest grade for the milk. Seoul Milk was the first to introduce the premium milk in the local market in 2005, upgrading the overall quality.

Under the “Cold Chain System,” which the company adopted from 1984, milk is refrigerated from the dairy farm until it reaches consumers so that it remains fresh all the time..

It was also the first to mark manufacturing dates on milk packages here, introducing the concept in 2009. Before then, milk manufacturers only marked the expiration date of the milk. It was a somewhat natural choice for them as the regulation also requires that they used either manufacturing or expiration dates. Seoul Milk, however, chose to use both, to better serve consumers’ rights to know about products and build up stronger trust among consumers. As the milk naturally becomes less fresh from manufacturing, this date is helping consumers have more information regarding the freshness of the milk.

Seoul Milk is currently running an advertisement introducing the innovations it has made in the milk industry. The advertisement was filmed not in the studio but on a farm, in a customer center and a market to authentically show the effort it makes to supply fresh milk.