Homeplus exclusively launches Paik's Coffee ice cream

Models pose with tubs of Paik's Coffee ice cream at the Homeplus discount store in Gangseo-gu, western Seoul, Monday. / Courtesy of Homeplus

By Baek Byung-yeul

Homeplus has exclusively launched a new range of ice cream that comes in the flavors of popular drinks offered at local coffee chain Paik's Coffee, the country's leading discount store chain said Monday.

Collaborating with Paik's Coffee and Lotte Foods, Homeplus began selling three kinds of ice cream that come in 474-milliliter tubs. The three flavors are strawberry banana, nicknamed “ddalba” in Korean; milk ice cream and chocolate ice cream. Each tub is priced at 2,800 won ($2.37) and is available at Homeplus stores nationwide and online.

The company said it tried to reinterpret the popular coffee drinks in the form of ice cream to deliver a new grocery shopping experience.

“We decided to develop the new ice cream product in order to provide a popular summer food at an affordable price. It took seven months for us to come up with the new ice cream product since November 2018,” the company said.

“The strawberry banana ice cream is combined with strawberry concentrate and pureed banana. To offer the real taste of milk, the milk ice cream contains 10 percent milk and chocolate powder is used to give a rich chocolate flavor for the chocolate ice cream,” it added.

Homeplus expects the ice cream products will become smash hit items as they were received well during the limited trial sales period in June.

“We conducted the online trial sales for a week from June 13 to 19 and sold more than 25,000 products during the period. This is four times more than other similarly sized ice cream products,” the company said.

Homeplus said the collaboration is also benefiting the manufacturer of the ice cream. “The ice cream manufacturer can expand tits market share by taking advantage of a high-profile consumer brand and also secure a stable market for its products,” the company said.

The hypermarket chain said it will keep collaborating with different kinds of brands so that it can offer novelty products that are not easy to see in other supermarket chains.

“Homeplus decided to roll out the ice cream products to offer a new experience and enjoyment for consumers. We will continue to cooperate with various kinds of brands to provide high-quality and cost-effective products that are not easy to find elsewhere,” said an official at the company's processed foods purchasing team.