Foodcoa Chairman Kim Young-sik long described his years as a child laborer as "a shameful past" he kept hidden. After appearing on a television program recently and sharing his full story for the first time, he said, "A weight lifted from my shoulders. I realized I had been holding myself down." [Hong Seok-hee]
Foodcoa Chairman Kim Young-sik long described his years as a child laborer as "a shameful past" he kept hidden. After appearing on a television program recently and sharing his full story for the first time, he said, "A weight lifted from my shoulders. I realized I had been holding myself down." [Hong Seok-hee]

Eldest of five siblings, father a Guro Industrial Complex worker — seven in a hillside shanty

From child laborer to civil servant exam passer: 'I hid my past, but telling it all made me feel lighter'

CEO Kim Jun-hu: 'At first I hated throwing away bread that fell on the floor' — a three-generation legacy of honesty

"It was a kind of shameful past for me. So I kept it hidden. But once I let it all out, it felt like putting down a heavy load I had been carrying on my shoulders my whole life."

Kim Young-sik, chairman of food company Foodcoa, opened up about his childhood Tuesday at the company's factory in Anseong, Gyeonggi Province — stories he had kept to himself for a long time. They were stories of a boyhood spent in a hillside shanty and of working as a child laborer to earn money. Behind the career of a man who now leads a food company that posted 143 billion won ($104 million) in consolidated sales last year lies a long-suppressed memory of poverty.

Kim's father was a worker at the Guro Industrial Complex in Seoul, laboring there in the early days of industrialization when factories producing wigs, garments and shoes for export were clustered in the area. Kim was born the eldest of five siblings. His parents and the five children — seven people in all — lived together in a hillside shanty.

"We were dirt poor. My father had little education and worked in a factory," Kim recalled. "But he was a very strict man. He hated lying and anything dishonest."

Poverty drove the young Kim into the workforce. It was an era when part-time jobs of the kind teenagers can easily find today were scarce. Kim worked at various sites as a child laborer from an early age.

But he did not stay there. Telling himself he could not go on living that way and needed to study more, he returned to his books and ultimately passed the civil servant examination. He then went to work for Japan Tobacco, selling the then-popular cigarette brand Mild Seven.

Frequent business trips to Japan later became the turning point that steered his life toward the food industry. Every time he walked into a Japanese convenience store, what caught his eye was shelving packed with bread, desserts and other food products. Watching the convenience store food market expand in Japan, Kim saw potential for the same growth in Korea's convenience store food and bakery sectors. The shifts he observed in Japan's convenience store food market — glimpsed during trips made to sell cigarettes — became one of the reasons he eventually turned his attention to the food business.

Kim acquired Foodcoa in 2009, taking over a company that was struggling financially and building it up. Combined consolidated sales for Foodcoa and its affiliate Joyfood reached 143 billion won last year.

Even after succeeding as a businessman, he did not readily speak about his early years. He gave numerous media interviews over the years, but they focused mainly on his life after starting the business. The years before his time as a child laborer were almost entirely unknown.

"I went through an extremely poor childhood, and I wondered whether there was any need to talk about it," Kim said. "I thought of it as a shameful past, so I kept it hidden."

What changed his mind was a recent request from a television program. He declined at first. The production team was interested in his life before he became a businessman and came all the way to Anseong to see him. He agreed to a 30-minute meeting, and after talking it through, decided to appear on the show.

Filming lasted about six days. During that time, Kim laid out his life from the beginning for the first time — from his days in the shanty to his years as a child laborer — things he had never shared publicly before. An unexpected change came after filming wrapped.

Pointing to both his shoulders with his right hand, Kim said, "After telling it all, what had been weighing me down was gone." He rolled his shoulders and added, "It felt like I had been carrying a heavy load on my shoulders my whole life, but after telling my whole story, this felt lighter."

"I realized I had been holding myself down," he said. "Poverty is no crime, and everyone had a hard time back then. I thought I should have spoken up sooner."

Alongside the memory of poverty, another legacy Kim carries from his father is the value of honesty — a principle his father never compromised on for his children, even in hardship.

"There is one thing I learned from my father: 'Even if you are poor, you must be honest,'" Kim said. "That was drilled into my head from childhood, and I tried to uphold it the same way when running the company."

He said this is especially important in the food industry, where consumers cannot see the production process and manufacturers must hold themselves to their own standards.

"Consumers have no way of knowing whether the ingredients that go into a product are past their expiration date," Kim said. "So the people who make food must be honest. You follow the law, you follow the rules, and you do not cut corners or use workarounds."

The principle passed down from his father now carries on to his son. Kim Jun-hu, Kim's son and CEO of Foodcoa, joined the company in 2020 and spent about a year working on the production line without letting anyone know he was the chairman's son.

He lived in the company dormitory alongside factory workers and stood on the production line with them. A young man who readily lifted heavy objects for his older female colleagues was a rare sight on the food manufacturing floor, and he was said to have been quite popular among the women he worked with.

Father and son resemble each other closely enough that his identity might have been discovered, but on the production floor everyone wore caps, masks and sanitary uniforms, and no one recognized him. Kim Jun-hu said it was only after he moved to the office a year later that employees learned he was the chairman's son.

What Kim Jun-hu saw firsthand on the production floor was the same honesty his father had always preached. "The floor was always kept spotlessly clean, but even so, any bread or ingredients that fell on the floor were thrown away," he said. "The same went for anything even slightly past its expiration date. Honestly, at first I thought it was a waste."

"My father always told employees to make products honestly, and that philosophy had filtered down to the workers on the floor," Kim Jun-hu said. "Seeing that with my own eyes taught me a great deal, and I am still learning from my father today."

The honesty that a Guro Industrial Complex worker taught his son became the management philosophy of a businessman who started out as a child laborer — and is now being passed on to the second generation.

"The smaller a company is and the tighter its finances, the more tempting it can be to cut corners — but that is precisely when sticking to principles is what keeps a business going for the long term," Kim said. "I always tell my son to be honest. It may look like a loss in the short run, but consumers will recognize it eventually. I hope our employees and my son will lead this company the same way."


hong@heraldcorp.com