By Lee Hyo-sik
Korea Grand Sale, the country’s largest shopping festival to attract foreign tourists during the off-season, grew nearly three-fold this year from 2011, enabling hotels and other hospitality businesses to reap record-high revenues.
The Visit Korea Committee said Sunday that nearly 22,900 department stores, shopping malls, hotels, restaurants, duty free shops, theme parks and other hospitality-related establishments saw their combined sales jump by 34.5 billion won ($30 million) in 2012, thanks to the festival, up from 12.1 billion won in 2011.
A year earlier, about 13,000 businesses took part in the nationwide shopping event in Seoul, Busan and other top tourist destinations across the country.
The committee, a quasi-government organization set up two years ago with the mission to draw non-Korean visitors, kicked off the festival on Jan. 9, which lasted for 52 days through Feb. 29.
During that period, foreign visitors used a total of 600,000 discount coupons and membership cards at retailers, restaurants and other businesses here, up from 190,000 last year. Coupons offered non-Korean shoppers up to a 50 percent discount on various merchandise and services.
“It is encouraging that more domestic hotels and retailers took part in this year’s shopping festival and generated larger sales revenues,” said Hong Ju-min, secretary-general of the Visit Korea Committee.
“We will offer foreign independent travelers a wider range of shopping benefits and organize more promotional events for them. We are going to continue developing more diverse content and carrying out marketing activities in order to develop the Korea Grand Sale into one of the world’s most unique shopping festivals.”
Hong also said unlike sales events organized by Hong Kong and other countries, the Korea Grand Sale offers foreign tourists a chance to experience hallyu, or the Korean wave, on top of special discounts.
“We should turn the festival into the country’s most popular shopping event for foreign visitors. It will also help improve Korea’s image among foreigners.”
According to the Korea Tourism Organization, the number of people visiting Korea jumped 29 percent to 753,793 in January from a year earlier. Chinese visitors from the mainland, Hong Kong and Taiwan numbered 167,022, up 47 percent from the previous year. Japanese totaled 244,370, up 25 percent.
Non-Korean tourists spent a total of $1 billion in January, up 21 percent from a year ago, with the per-capita spending increasing to $1,345 from $1,250 over the one-year period.
For more information on Korea Grand Sale, visit the committee’s website at www.visitkoreayear.com, or call 02-720-7343.
leehs@koreatimes.co.kr