Maxim Mocha Gold sells about 5.3 billion sticks in a year as brand marks 37th anniversary

Dongsuh Foods announced Thursday that Maxim Mocha Gold sold about 5.3 billion sticks over the past year, as the product marks its 37th anniversary this year.

Launched in 1989, Maxim Mocha Gold has held the top position in South Korea's coffee-mix market ever since. Dongsuh Foods introduced the world's first coffee mix in 1976 and has continued developing new products since. The brand's core competitive edge lies in what it calls a "golden ratio" — a blend of coffee beans calibrated to suit Korean palates.

The brand's current advertising campaign, featuring actor Park Bo-young, carries the message "Be happy now, have a cup of happiness now." At the end of the commercial, Park savors a cup of Mocha Gold in a yellow mug as the tagline appears: "This happiness, the soul knows — Korea's soul coffee."

Experiential marketing has also been a consistent part of the brand's strategy. Since 2015, Dongsuh Foods has run a series of pop-up projects in major cities across the country, including Busan, Jeonju, Gunsan and Gyeongju. Each edition of the "Mocha Gold Pop-up Cafe" adopts a different theme — past iterations have taken the form of a tearoom, bookshop, photo studio, post office, broadcasting station, alleyway and traditional house. Last year's "Maxim House" in Gyeongju, which ran for about a month, drew attention as an experiential space blending traditional and contemporary sensibilities.

"Maxim Mocha Gold has earned consumers' love for more than 30 years thanks to our coffee expertise and the sincerity with which we have tried to share the happiness that a single cup of coffee can bring," a Dongsuh Foods official said. "We plan to continue developing products focused on taste and aroma, while rolling out a variety of marketing activities that allow us to connect with consumers."