Bookmarks inside 3,000-won bread sell for up to 29,000 won on resale platforms

Random-draw thrill of 3,000-won bread captures millennials and Gen Z

From Dubai Chewy Cookie to Chipotle, South Korea's sold-out food crazes keep coming

Yu Se-hyeon, a worker in her 20s, visited a convenience store at 8 a.m. to coincide with the morning restock and bought three Minumsa bread loaves. The "Conversations with Goethe" bookmark resells for 16,500 won ($12) on secondhand platforms. [Provided by reader]

Minumsa bread products, which have drawn attention first for selling out and now for their bookmarks fetching high prices on secondhand platforms. [Provided by GS Retail]

"Is this bread, or a bookmark lottery?"

In an era when people queue up just to buy a loaf of bread, what they are actually after is the small plastic slip tucked inside. The bookmarks bundled with Minumsa bread — launched by GS25 on Aug. 21 — have long since outpaced the price of the bread itself, trading hands for the cost of a full book, and sometimes more.

According to industry sources, popular designs among the 20 bookmark varieties are selling on secondhand platforms at a premium. The "Pride and Prejudice" bookmark is the standout example: the Minumsa World Literature Series edition of the novel retails for 13,000 won, yet the bookmark has been listed for as much as 29,000 won — nearly twice the price of the book itself. Bookmarks for "Hamlet" and "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" have also fetched double the price of the bread.

Two weeks after launch, demand shows no sign of cooling. Shoppers time their visits to coincide with restock deliveries, and entire display trays sell out before staff can set them on the shelves. Store owners are scrambling to secure supply, and some locations have imposed a one-per-customer limit. Cumulative sales reached 710,000 units as of Tuesday.

Hwang Jin-ju, an adjunct professor of consumer studies at Inha University, said the purchase is not really about bread. "Consumers appear to be buying bread, but in practice they are acquiring a collectible — the bookmark," she said. "The randomness stimulates dopamine and the urge to collect, and the more a desired item fails to appear, the more it drives additional purchases."

Yu Se-hyeon, a worker in her 20s, was at a convenience store by 8 a.m. before heading to work and walked away with a "Conversations with Goethe" bookmark — one that resells for 16,500 won ($12) on secondhand platforms. "Everyone was saying it was hot, so I thought, I want one too," she said. "The fact that the bookmark is random made it even more exciting and desirable." She added that she finds herself frequently buying small items that bring a little happiness amid the daily grind.

Several factors are driving the craze. The "random-crack" unboxing trend popular among people in their 20s and 30s — where the contents are unknown until the package is opened — generates anticipation and a dopamine rush. Not knowing which of the 20 bookmark designs will appear turns the unwrapping itself into a game. The 3,000-won price point also lowers the barrier to entry: Pop Mart products, widely regarded as the go-to destination for random-draw collectibles, typically run around 16,000 won.

A social media post announcing the discontinuation of Orion's Chokchokhan Hwang Cheese Chip. [Instagram]

The bookmark designs have also played a role. Rather than reproducing standard World Literature Series covers, GS25 used artwork that proved popular at this year's Seoul International Book Fair. The timing aligned with a broader reading wave among people in their 20s and 30s, fueled in part by Minumsa's own YouTube channel. The trend reflects a culture in which publishers, authors and book design are consumed as content — not just the books themselves.

Reading interest among younger Koreans is notably high. The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism's 2025 National Reading Survey found that the overall adult annual reading rate last year fell 4.5 percentage points from 2023 to 38.5 percent, a record low. Among people in their 20s, however, the rate stood at 75.3 percent — roughly double the adult average.

Buyers of Minumsa bread have skewed heavily toward women in their 20s and 30s. Women in their 20s accounted for the largest share at 26 percent, followed by women in their 30s at 25 percent. Women in their 40s made up 13 percent, and men in their 20s accounted for 10 percent. Together, women in their 20s and 30s represented 51 percent of all buyers.

Resale markups and early-morning store rushes are nothing new in South Korea. Haitai Confectionery's Honey Butter Chip, launched in 2014, set the template: at the height of that craze, listings appeared online selling empty bags, and one post even offered "Honey Butter Chip scent." In March this year, Orion's Chokchokhan Hwang Cheese Chip sold out almost immediately after launch — 380,000 boxes, or about 5.032 million individual bags, shipped within two weeks.

Late last year, the Dubai Chewy Cookie took its turn. Word spread rapidly on social media, triggering store rushes across the country, and as the product grew scarce, individual cookies were changing hands on secondhand platforms for well over 20,000 won each. Chipotle, which opened its first South Korean location on Sept. 2, drew lines stretching more than an hour from the moment the doors opened. The frenzy is expected to continue until additional locations open.

Hwang said social media authentication posts — in which buyers show off what they obtained — let consumers express their identity while simultaneously giving companies free, user-generated marketing. "The combination of randomness and scarcity is becoming the standard hit recipe for businesses," she said, "but because these crazes are hard to sustain, companies need to think about new ways to drive the next wave of consumption."

A staff member arranges Dubai Chewy Cookies on a display shelf at a cafe in Jongno-gu, Seoul. [Herald DB]

siuu@heraldcorp.com