"Waitlisting begins at 8:40 a.m."
That is the notice greeting visitors to the Changuk Tteok pop-up at The Hyundai Seoul in Yeouido. The department store does not open until 10:30 a.m., yet customers were already forming a line more than two hours earlier. From the pop-up's opening day on Aug. 14 through the following day, the pre-opening waitlist filled up every morning before the store unlocked its doors.
The draw is simple: freshly steamed rice cake, served on the spot. Because Changuk Tteok's flagship store is in Gwangju, tasting its tteok straight from the steamer has long meant making the trip south. That scarcity is precisely what sent so many people to queue before dawn.
Changuk Tteok's pumpkin injeolmi, sold on the online grocery platform Kurly, has held a spot near the top of the popularity rankings since early this year — a notable feat given that the list is otherwise dominated by everyday staples such as tofu, eggs and milk.
The tteok craze extends well beyond one brand. Department stores, shopping malls and hypermarkets across the country are riding the same wave, offering everything from classic rice cakes to inventive creations topped with fresh fruit or cream. Lines of customers who discovered these shops through word of mouth or SNS have become a routine sight.
The broader market reflects the momentum. According to the Ministry of Statistics' domestic sales data by product category, the tteok market has expanded at an annual rate of 5 to 7 percent in recent years. Domestic sales of tteok products reached 929.1 billion won in 2024, up 65 percent from 564.1 billion won ($402 million) in 2018. Industry observers attribute the growth to rising demand from trend-conscious younger consumers as well as foreign tourists seeking out K-food.
Hanjeong-seon, which has outlets in all three major department store chains, is another beneficiary. The brand has built a following around its "fruit mochi" — a combination of fresh fruit and glutinous rice cake — and recently added a menu item featuring yogurt and whole fruit inside the mochi. On Aug. 8 at Hyundai Department Store's Trade Center branch, about 50 people were waiting in line at the Hanjeong-seon counter in the food and beverage section.
![Customers line up at the Hanjeong-seon store on the first below-ground floor of Lotte Department Store's main branch in Sogong-dong, Jung-gu, Seoul. [Provided by Lotte Department Store]](https://wimg.heraldcorp.com/news/cms/2026/08/20/news-p.v1.20260820.8d910325e0ea417ca3bd927204333903_P1.png)
Near the counter, many customers were eating mochi with both hands, and some were filming the glutinous rice cake as it stretched. A 30-year-old surnamed Kim who visited that day said she had joined the queue out of curiosity after seeing how long it was. "I heard the blueberry yogurt mochi was the best, so I bought that," she said. Her companion, a 28-year-old surnamed Ahn, said the family was already a fan. "We buy it whenever we spot a store," Ahn said.
Dessert sales at major department stores are also on a clear upward trajectory. Bakery and dessert sales at Lotte Department Store's main branch rose 50 percent year on year in July and 60 percent from Aug. 1 through Aug. 18. The flagship carries Hanjeong-seon alongside several other tteok and dessert brands, including Gyeonggi Tteokjip, Gyeonghoeru, Golden Piece and 1994 Seoul.
Shinsegae Sweet Park, a dedicated dessert destination, drew a string of popular new tenants and posted a 31.1 percent year-on-year sales increase from July 1 through Aug. 17. Over the same period, overall food and beverage sales at Hyundai Department Store rose 28.6 percent.
The tteok boom is equally visible in hypermarket data. E-mart's frozen tteok sales last month surged 127.7 percent year on year, and from Aug. 1 through Aug. 18 the figure climbed to 171.2 percent. Deli tteok and Korean traditional confections rose 2.4 percent and 11.2 percent, respectively, over the same stretch. Lotte Mart reported a 17.1 percent year-on-year increase in tteok sales from Aug. 1 through Aug. 18.
Social media has amplified the trend. The tteok hashtag on Instagram has accumulated 872,000 posts, while the tteok dessert hashtag has reached 51,000. Individual brand hashtags for Changuk Tteok, Hanjeong-seon and Gyeonggi Tteokjip have each surpassed 5,000. Industry watchers say the consumer appetite for novel desserts — previously channeled into trends like "dujjonku" — has now shifted toward tteok, a food with centuries of history.
"As more consumers in the dessert market gravitate toward chewy, soft textures, interest in tteok has been growing," an industry official said. "Products that go beyond traditional rice cake by adding fruit or cream so they can be enjoyed like a dessert are getting a strong response from younger generations."
siuu@heraldcorp.com
