Chungcheongnam-do

▲ A sales booth at the largest Korean American festival in the U.S.

The city of Seosan performs aggressive and systematic marketing for the export of agro-specialty crops. Seosan participated in and successfully finished LA Korean Festival and Orange County Arirang Festival held in the state of California, two of the largest Korean festivals in the United States, starting on the 4th.  

The city has been seeking entry into the Korean-American market in North America starting with the western part of the U.S. in 2015, eastern and western U.S. in 2016 and eastern Canada in 2017, achieving sales of KRW 180 million in 2015, KRW 280 million in 2016 and 230 million in 2017.

Due to local conditions, a marketing event was not held this year but, instead, it operated sales (PR) booths for specialty agricultural products at the LA Korean Festival (Oct. 4-7) and in Orange County (Oct. 11-14).
 

Seosan shipped 20 kinds of agro-specialty crops worth about $50,000 (approximately KRW 55,000,000) from the Port of Busan to the Port of Long Beach in the western U.S., and expects additional shipments including those to be sold in local markets.

The city plans to dispatch two responsible civil officials to support sales (PR) at the Orange County Arirang Festival which it participates in for the first time ever and to meet with representatives from Wang Globalnet, a Korean agrifood exporter, and local markets such as Hannam Chain and Zion Market in order to carry out active sales promotion activities for agro-specialty crops produced in Seosan.

In particular, it will also visit the Korean American Federation of Orange County with which it signed an MOU in 2015 for the expanded purchase of agro-specialty products, to request continuous PR towards Korean Americans abroad for continuous purchases.
 

A representative from the city stated, “We will continue to closely cooperate with local Korean associations, importers, distributors, etc. and promote active overseas marketing to strive for securing foreign sales routes and increasing the status of Seosan agro-specialty crops.”