Korean Job Discussion Forums

[sojourner1]

You might ask: Why don't you just shop Homeplus or Costco? Well, there's no locations within 5 hours of my location however I do have 2 Emarts 2 to 2.5 hours of me. No other stores out here don't even carry as much as limited Emart and those other small stores all carry the same craptastic severely limited selection.

Prices are rising while domestic products take up more floor space than before. Today, I noticed fewer import beers and more domestic MAX beers taking the space once occupied by import beers. The floor was also loaded with a larger mountain of plastic bottle craptastic beer to the point of there not being enough room for people in the drink department. They have a good hefeweizen, but only 5 bottles were to be had. There's no other hard liquor than over priced whisky, except the most craptastic cheap London Gin. No rum, no Crown, no decent quality gin and vodka. Also no good Italian and French red merlot wine; it's all cheap South American. Alcohol only demonstrates one aspect of the many issues with supply and selection so common in such a place as Korea.

Why such little supply with limited selection? Are they retarded when it comes to doing business? Don't consumers clamor for more with being forced to be deal with limited high priced shopping options as this? With such huge numbers in the customer base, why no super large stores with awesome selection like we have in America with the Wal*Mart supercenter concept? Why no small specialty stores such as liquor stores that deal in offering more selections that large stores don't carry? I'm also talking about other kinds of smaller pricey specialty stores too that might specialize in import products such as Global Foods. I still don't get Korea when it comes to shopping, dining, and what's to be had for fun other than their love of mountain hiking. It's truly a sellers market for sure and that's the way domestic producers want to keep it. Customers are only cash cows; not valued and served for what they want and wish for. Korea's either crazy or simply ignorant if they want and enjoy things the way they currently are in the shopping arena.

No Christmas cards to be had. They did have a tiny Christmas department the size of a bed with tiny Christmas trees and light sets. Oddly, one of the 3 small trees on display was decorated with gold plastic marijuana leafs.

There was no bake ware available such as pizza pans and cookie sheets.

There's too many sales people standing around in the way doing nothing with space to move about being at a premium.

I did get assistance before I personally searched myself to confirm the sales lady telling me there are no Christmas cards and bakeware. She was right.

It really was a disappointing way to spend 30,000 won on RT transportation and 8 hours of my Saturday so I'm going to just live on Gmarket and my local small grocer from now on. I only wish you could buy import beer and ham off the internet, but you can't to my knowledge. I was happy they had those tiny little hams for 3,600 won that are just like real large sized American hams since they were out last time I went.

I got 5 bottles of hefewiezen and 4 cans of a 8.9% hefewiezen beer, 4 slabs of baby back pork ribs along with 4 extra small hams. I searched high and low for beans to no avail. This really is my best attempt at a beer and ham run. OK, I need to go to Seoul!!! Pretty sorry shopping trip, but I'm enjoying those 4 wonderful high quality bottles of beer tonight at a premium cost.

This is my experience of the Gangneung Emart and it's much better than Taebaeks tiny rinky dink one floor Emart with an even more limited selection.

[ciccone_youth]

I've been quite disappointed with E Mart and Homeplus lately as well- the prices went up significantly, and at Homeplus I was having a hard time finding all the Tesco products they used to offer. They used to have 3-4 kinds of Tesco cereal, and I cannot find them anymore.

[crescent]

Not to muzzle your rant, but... if Koreans actually wanted foreign products, they would be stocked more. In times of economic uncertainty, national products take even more shelf space, and low selling items lose their shelf space. Imports cost much more now.
Emart is practically the most profitable retailer in the country.

They suck by OUR standards, sure.. but since when has the local economy been quality driven?

[southern boy]

[Tjames426]

You will not find Christmas Cards. You will find fantastic New Year Cards at your local Post office.

Once you see the selection of New Year Cards and the selection...you will be amazed.

Great prices too.

[bassexpander]

We bought a big box of 30 hand-made Christmas cards at Costco (they say hand-made, anyway).

You can also find cards galore (usually Korean-themed, but really cool) in the basement of techno-mart in front of where the LG X-Note computer free PC bang is, just as you enter from the subway. Techno-mart is located at Gangbyeon station on the Green line in East Seoul.

[sojourner1]

[sojourner1]

[cangel]

10 reasons I hate EMart:

1) Stocking shelves during business hours
2) Going weeks/months without restocking items (parmesan cheese for example)
3) Changing locations of items on a whim and then finding them back in their regular locations 2 days later
4) Getting kicked out of the 5 item or under line when you have 6 items
5) 5, as in the number of spices available: salt, pepper, cinnamon, powdered ginger & garlic (although they do now have a few steak seasoning blends that are pretty lame)
6) Spaghetti noodles 5 aisles from spaghetti sauce
7) Carrots covered in dirt
8 ) Just stopped selling real butter (they previously had 2 varieties and now none-may return tomorrow so wait for update)
9)Can't buy 1 ice cream bar-always have to stuff a bag or buy a box
10) Mispriced items almost daily

[MrRogers]

- no lowfat yoghurt
-no oatmeal
- no bottles of lemon juice

[sojourner1]

I seen those bottles of Lazy Lemon juice shaped like a lemon today, but no oatmeal, beans, and fluffy style rice. Each store is so different. Some have it all and others are only partial, but there appears to be severe limitations as to what they can possibly have. I can't believe this is the Wal*Mart of Korea. Man, they just don't know what shopping really is.

[cdninkorea]

A year or so ago I was shopping for a kitchen knife at E-Mart. I found some in one aisle and others five aisles down. Stupified, I asked a sales clerk: why not put all the knives together for easy comparison?

Her answer: the cheap knives are in one aisle and expensive ones in another.

[Privateer]

Does Walmart sell ddok or laver or kimchi? Only if there's a market for it.

There's a whole industry devoted to researching which demographics prefer which products, because you have to understand the local market before you know what to put on the shelves. Why is this so hard to understand? Why are there recurrent threads complaining about Korean supermarkets?

Honestly, do you think immigrants in America complain that the supermarkets are 'backward' because they don't stock the foods their mothers used to cook??

You want foreigner foods, you go to the foreigner supermarkets like the Indian one in Itaewon.

[sojourner1]

Last time I checked, our supermarkets had kimchee, Korean/Chinese style glutanous rice, and many many other things Asian as well as almost any other kind of food. And this is not just in one part of the country like Itaewon is, but is all cities and even small towns all across the country. Sure it's not a 5 day Korean street market, but you can eat and drink like a Korean in America and even live like one behind closed doors. The Chinese and Indians do this all over the USA. There's many nationalities enjoying living as if they were home, but behind closed doors, because they don't have to eat American food nor be America even though they're there operating a business or working. In fact, a large section of our supermarket floors are dedicated to many tastes from around the world. Of course, America can do that, because she has super large sales floors and millions of immigrants who enjoy such an extensive selection while those of us born in the USA are spoiled on it. Heck, you don't need to travel to taste the world if you only see travel from a perspective of eating like the way many do. I go for the real places and real people so air travel is the way to go instead of just eating authentic curry cooked by real Thai or Indian people to say you understand Thailand and India. We have so many restaurants representing so many nationalities and tastes. Even experimental fusion. We just don't have the robust well paying job market anymore so that younger adults can enjoy the good life the older folks had built when they demanded with their robust earnings.

They experiment a lot in American product selection and many products end up on clearance, but at least they try to improve in better serving the wishes of such a diverse customer base. They do so little in Korea compared to what I'm spoiled on. When Koreans travel abroad or who have been abroad, they do know and understand this issue, but can't change it since the big wigs wield their almighty power to dictate how it's gonna be.

You might say Korea is a small country and it is, but other small countries like Germany can deliver a free market with many choices. Man screw this brainwashed boring nationalism, I'm outta here next warm season and I'm going to have a real meal with a good rum and coke afterward as soon as I go to town. Some new clothes will also be the order of the day too. Just have to be careful not to over eat and end up 19 pounds heavier. When I go, it feels like getting out of prison. Serious. That's just sounds silly, but true.

[knee-highs]