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SEOUL, June 15 (Reuters) – Starbucks Korea will shut all stores in the country at 3 p.m. on June 22 for staff training on historical awareness \u200cand social sensitivity, the operator Shinsegae Group said on Monday, following public \u200cbacklash over a marketing campaign.<\/p>\n
The coffee chain faced widespread criticism and suffered a “very significant” drop in sales after \u200blast month’s campaign that evoked a brutal 1980 military crackdown on pro-democracy protesters.<\/p>\n
Shinsegae’s affiliate E-Mart owns Starbucks Korea, which launched its ‘Tank Day’ tumbler promotion on the anniversary of the May 18 Gwangju Uprising, when the military government deployed troops and tanks to suppress pro-democracy demonstrations.<\/p>\n
Starbucks \u200cKorea headquarters staff and executives \u2060from Shinsegae’s E-Mart division will undergo the same training on June 17 at the group’s in-house training centre, while Shinsegae Chairman Chung Yong-jin \u2060and affiliate CEOs will attend a separate session on June 24, the group said.<\/p>\n
Shinsegae said the move reflected how seriously it viewed the recent marketing controversy and its commitment to preventing \u200ba recurrence. \u200bChung previously apologised publicly over the controversy.<\/p>\n
The \u200bhistory awareness lecture, led by a \u200chistory professor from Sungkyunkwan University, will review the major events in South Korea’s modern and contemporary history since the 1950s and discuss how they should be understood, it said.<\/p>\n
A separate social sensitivity training, conducted by a sociology professor at the same university, will look at how companies should consider social issues such as history, labour, gender and human \u200crights in marketing and other corporate activities, the \u200bcompany said.<\/p>\n
The company said it would be the first \u200bnationwide early closure of Starbucks Korea \u200bstores since the chain opened in the country in 1999.<\/p>\n
Starbucks Korea \u200calso plans to overhaul marketing approval procedures, \u200bincluding introducing a social-sensitivity \u200bchecklist covering history, commemorative dates, politics, disasters, military issues, gender, violence and hate expressions, Shinsegae said.<\/p>\n
Starbucks Korea had more than 2,000 stores in the country as \u200bof end-2024 according to its \u200cannual impact report. It is the country’s No. 1 coffee chain in \u200bterms of customer payments, according to data firm WISEAPP.<\/p>\n
(Reporting by Joyce Lee, Jack \u200bKim and Kyu-seok ShimEditing by Ed Davies)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n