The wine that pairs well with apricot salad is Domaine Schlumberger Gewürztraminer.
Bottle Bunker, a liquor specialty store operated by Lotte Mart, has renovated its first location in Jamsil and newly introduced a food and beverage (F&B) space called Bottle Bunker Bistro. It is a space where you can enjoy dishes that can be paired with over 5,000 types of wine, and it officially opened on the 19th after a year of preparation. Following a two-week trial operation, it is set to open officially on July 1.
On the afternoon of the 20th, I visited the Bottle Bunker in Jamsil, Songpa-gu, Seoul, where preparations were in full swing for the bistro. A new door connecting the bistro to the outside was also created. Here, guests can taste 15 menu items developed by Chef Gustavo Correa, who has experience in the U.S. Ritz-Carlton Hotel, Korea’s five-star Banyan Tree, and Michelin-starred restaurants in France, along with wines that pair well with the dishes.
Every morning, chefs source ingredients directly from the Lotte Mart one floor below to prepare menus. Seasonal dishes made with fresh ingredients like apricots and watermelons are newly introduced every month. The most expensive menu item is priced at 19,800 won and does not exceed 20,000 won. Chef Kang Leo, the head of the Lotte Mart Food Innovation Center, participated in menu development.
Park Hye-jin, head of the Bottle Bunker team, noted, "We applied the tasting tap, which was first introduced among domestic large supermarkets, to the bistro and suggest pairing wines that go well with the food," adding, "The key is to make pairing easy, so we didn’t set the prices high. We could keep the prices reasonable by using ingredients from Lotte Mart."
First introduced at the Jamsil location in December 2021, Bottle Bunker is a specialized store for Lotte Mart that deals with wines, whiskeys, and other liquors, currently operating three locations including Seoul Station and Sangmu. It gained popularity with the concept of "If it’s not here, it’s nowhere," creating a trend for liquor specialty stores in the industry.
Under current laws, alcohol can only be purchased offline, and Bottle Bunker is rated for successfully attracting customers with a strategy of setting up stores in Lotte Mart's regional base stores. At the Jamsil location, liquor category sales grew sixfold in the first year, while sales for the following year increased by about 5%.
However, the surge in wine demand during the pandemic has stagnated, increasing market anxiety. According to the Korea Customs Service, the domestic wine import volume last year was 56,542 tons, a decrease of about 20% compared to the previous year. The wine import volume peaked at 76,575 tons in 2021 and has been declining since 2022.
Accordingly, the annual revenue and operating profit of major companies that import and sell wine in Korea, such as Shinsegae L&B, Keumyang International, Ayoung FBC, and NARA CELLAR, have shown a downward trend since 2022. Emart's large liquor store, "Wine Club," located at Starfield Hanam, also closed its business in February after less than two years of operation due to lack of profitability and efficiency.
On the other hand, Lotte Mart has reinforced its content by renovating the Jamsil location, the first Bottle Bunker. This is considered the evolution to "Bottle Bunker 2.0." Despite the slowdown in liquor sales, the cumulative sales of Bottle Bunker from January to May this year have increased by about 5% compared to the previous year.
Park said, "The wine market, which was less than 1 trillion won before the pandemic, peaked at 2.3 trillion won in 2022 and is now decreasing in size," adding, "Some say the wine market is dead, but we believe the market has already grown significantly and is specializing in that field." He explained that Bottle Bunker was initially planned to attract offline customers, reflecting the rapid trends in the liquor market and evolving to 2.0.
In addition to the bistro, the product area at the Bottle Bunker Jamsil location has also been renovated. The most noticeable feature is the "Wine and Play" zone introduced at the Seoul Station location. It offers pairings of wine with music based on MBTI types. Additionally, the proportion of sake, whose demand has surged recently, has been more than doubled, and new zones for craft beer and highballs have been created. The cheese zone was relocated to a path frequently used by customers, resulting in sales increasing more than threefold compared to before.
On the 12th, the Bottle Bunker application was revamped with a focus on AI-based personalization features. It includes an "AI Sommelier" that recommends wines to customers in real time, a "Bottle Log" for managing wine and whiskey purchase histories, and functions for checking inventory status and display locations at each store.
It can also be used via voice command. When I used the app to ask for a recommendation for a red wine costing around 50,000 won to drink during a dinner gathering with pork belly, recommended wines appeared. I could select a product I liked, place an order, and pick it up at the store.
Lotte Mart is also expanding the "Bottle Bunker Select" stores that can be applied to smaller stores. After introducing it at the Lotte Super Grand Grocery in Dogok in November of last year, it is set to open at Lotte Mart in Guri next week.
Park, head of the team, said, "On the 18th, we invited 30 customers for a bistro demonstration event, and all the tickets were sold out within 15 minutes of reservations opening. The customers’ reactions were also very favorable," adding, "The purpose of Bottle Bunker is to popularize wine. We will create various opportunities for customers to easily try as many different kinds of wine as possible."