Food
South Korean F&B giant SPC Group has ambitions to expand its US business fivefold by 2020.
Chairman Hur Young-in unveiled his plans when meeting in Seoul this week with US foreign affairs committee chairman Ed Royce and congressman Ami Bera. The two politicians were visiting Korea to discuss trade opportunities and establish partnerships in Korea.
“We are planning to increase the number of Paris Baguette stores in the US to 300 by 2020, creating up to 10,000 new jobs,” Hur told Royce when they met at the company’s headquarters.
Royce said the bakery brand had contributed to job creation in the US by employing more than 1500 people, and would play a key role in the global food industry in the future, reports the Korea Times.
SPC established a US affiliate in 2002 and opened America’s first Paris Baguette in Los Angeles three years later. It now has 57 stores in the US and last year invested more than $48 million to report annual sales of $100 million and introduce 1500 jobs.
Paris Baguette became Korea’s first bakery brand to enter the French capital, setting up a business base in July 2014 to expand to other French and European cities. Stores were opened in Shanghai in 2004, and in Ho Chi Minh City and Singapore in 2012.
