Retailers offer bigger deals for Korean Black Friday

Retailers have marked down prices further for a government-led nationwide sales event dubbed Korean Black Friday after it faced ridicule for the lack of preparation.

On Tuesday, the sixth day since the grand sale event launched, major department store chains said they will offer additional bargain deals on the trot only a day after the government said it would put spurs to the grand sale.

The event aimed at fueling domestic consumption will run through Oct. 14 with some 70 businesses and 33,000 stores taking part.

Lotte Department Store said that 40 more brands will participate and some 70 stores will increase their discount rates by 10 to 20 percentage points.

“To live up to customers’ expectations and help revitalization of the domestic market, we beefed up various additional events with partners,” said Lee Wan-shin, marketing director of Lotte Department Store.

Other retail giants including Shinsegae and Hyundai Department stores also offered up to 10-20 percent additional discounts on certain brands.

On Monday, the government announced that it will encouraging more firms to take part and review to hold the event annually in a more organized system.

“There has been criticism that the sales fell short of expectation because it was arranged in relative haste,” said Hwang Kyu-yearn, deputy minister for industrial creativity and innovation at the Industry Ministry.

“Through discussions with companies participating in the event, we plan to expand the number of items and discount rates. And they are expected to respond positively (to the government’s call) as sales of most major outlets have grown over the past few days,” he said.

Over the past five days since the event was launched, sales at major department store chains jumped 10.9 percent and major discount outlet chains surged 13.8 percent from the same period last year.

Some market insiders, however, note that many loopholes still need to be filled to regularize the shopping promotion campaign such as schedules, promotion method and participants.

They said such a nationwide bargain event needs to be held during the end of the year season when companies are more keen to clear up inventories.

Unlike this year’s event that only retailers take part in, the active involvement of manufacturers is needed as some suppliers took the burden of slashing prices, they said.