With inflation squeezing household budgets, South Korean consumers are hunting for value. Convenience stores are widely seen as pricier than discount chains and supermarkets, yet more shoppers are paying the premium anyway. Why?
Sales at hypermarkets plunged 9.7% in the first half of this year from a year earlier, while convenience store sales rose 1.1%, the only offline retail channel to keep growing, according to a first-half 2026 FMCG trend report from global consumer intelligence firm NIQ released on the 2nd.
Convenience store sales have risen for 11 straight months since July last year. Sales in May jumped 5.9% from a year earlier, the biggest gain in two years. The sector's total market size reached 31.6 trillion won in 2025, up 19% over five years, Statistics Korea data showed.
Buy-One-Get-One Deals and Telecom Discounts Can Make Convenience Stores Cheaper
The assumption that convenience stores are expensive is breaking down. As high prices push shoppers toward nearby stores and smaller purchases, convenience stores are evolving into neighborhood grocery platforms. A bottle of water that sells for 900 won at a supermarket costs 1,500 won at a convenience store, but buy-one-get-one and two-for-three promotions can make the convenience store the cheaper option. Membership discounts of 5% to 10% from telecom carriers including SK Telecom, KT and LG Uplus widen the gap further.
At GS25, vegetable sales surged 128.1% in May from a year earlier. Analysts attribute the shift to the rise of one- and two-person households, which increasingly buy only what they need at a nearby store rather than in bulk at a hypermarket.
Fun and experience, beyond price, are also drawing shoppers. Major chains are racing to open specialty outlets, widening the gap with standard stores. At the roughly 500 tourism-focused CU outlets, sales in related categories climbed 58.7% from January through August compared with a year earlier.
Seven-Eleven stores converted to its location-tailored "New Wave" format saw customer counts and average spending per visit rise by as much as 60%. Sales in core categories at specialty stores, including ready meals, wine, fresh food and beauty products, ran from two to 20 times those of standard outlets.
Convenience stores have also expanded into parcel delivery, banking and administrative services, becoming everyday infrastructure that draws more frequent visits. GS25's discount parcel service sends packages under 1 kilogram for less than 2,000 won, cheaper than the roughly 3,000 won charged by dedicated delivery firms.
Government support programs, including consumption coupons and livelihood recovery payments, also lifted convenience store sales. With close-to-home shopping and small-volume buying now structurally entrenched, the industry broadly expects convenience store growth to continue for some time.
