Saeukkang (; also called Shrimp Cracker) is a

South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia. It constitutes the southern half of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and borders North Korea along the Korean Demilitarized Zone, with the Yellow Sea to the west and t ...

n snack produced by South Korean company

Nongshim Nongshim Co., Ltd. () is a South Korean multinational food and beverage company headquartered in Seoul, South Korea. Nongshim was founded in 1965 under the name Lotte Food Industrial Company. The name was changed to Nongshim in 1978. The curren ...

since 1971. Around 90g of prawn crackers (around 4-5 sheets) are packaged in parchment paper.

History

Name

'Saeu' translates to shrimp in Korean. When

President Shin Choon-ho was looking for an appropriate name for the shrimp snack, he got an idea from his daughter mispronouncing

Arirang ''Arirang'' ( ) is a Korean folk song. There are about 3,600 variations of 60 different versions of the song, all of which include a refrain similar to "arirang, arirang, arariyo" (""). It is estimated that the song is more than 600 years old ...

(), pronouncing it 'Arikkang' ().

Development

The Nongshim company got ideas from the popular Japanese snack Kappa Ebisen made by Calbee. Nongshim spent more than a year attempting to reverse engineer the Kappa Ebisen snack and had particular difficulty with finding an appropriate temperature to cook the product. The company used large amounts of

flour Flour is a powder made by Mill (grinding), grinding raw grains, List of root vegetables, roots, beans, Nut (fruit), nuts, or seeds. Flours are used to make many different foods. Cereal flour, particularly wheat flour, is the main ingredie ...

and

shrimp A shrimp (: shrimp (American English, US) or shrimps (British English, UK)) is a crustacean with an elongated body and a primarily Aquatic locomotion, swimming mode of locomotion – typically Decapods belonging to the Caridea or Dendrobranchi ...

during this process, using around 360 tons of flour.

Sales

Using the slogan ''We make our foods using our technology'', Saeukkang was highly successful upon release and helped Nongshim, which previously had a low market share, to grow into what is now among the largest food and beverage companies in South Korea. Many trucks from all around South Korea traveled to Nongshim's factory in Daebang-dong to buy Saeukkang. Only three months after the initial release, Nongshim's sales had already increased by 350%. With their increased income, Nongshim was able to release other successful snacks: Banana Kick in 1978, Honey Twist Snack in 1979, and Potato Chip in 1980. As of 2013, Saeukkang's sales exceeded 7.5 billion packages. Saeukkang can now be found in 76 countries in stores like

Walmart Walmart Inc. (; formerly Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.) is an American multinational retail corporation that operates a chain of hypermarkets (also called supercenters), discount department stores, and grocery stores in the United States and 23 other ...

in the United States and

Taobao Taobao is a Chinese online shopping platform. It is headquartered in Hangzhou and is owned by Alibaba. According to Alexa rank, it was the eighth most-visited website globally in 2021. Taobao.com was registered on April 21, 2003 by Alibaba Cl ...

in China.

Variants

produces different variants of Saeukkang. Other than the standard package (90g), the company introduced different sizes of Saeukkang: * Mini Saeukkang (30g) * Deluxe Saeukkang (400g). Nongshim also offers Saeukkang in different flavors: * Spicy Saeukkang * Rice Saeukkang * Sweet & Sour Chicken Saeukkang

Marketing

TV CF

Lee Jong-suk, a Korean actor and model advertises Saeukkan

Since the initial release of the snack, it has been advertised with the sloga
"손이 가요~ 손이 가~새우깡에 손이 가요
(loosely translated as "Grab some here, grab some there. Grab Saeukkang anywhere". The slogan has been so successful that it is still used in Saeukkang ads today.

Fan Clubs

There are about 100 Saeukkang fan clubs in Korea's largest web portal,

Naver Naver (; stylized as NAVER) is a South Korean online platform operated by the Naver Corporation. The company's products include a search engine, email hosting, blogs, maps, and mobile payment. History Naver was the first Korean web provide ...

, consisting of both younger and older generations.

Criticism

* In 2005, criticism rose as the snack's shape and packaging looked similar to the Japanese snack Kappa Ebisen. * In 2008, there was a report from a consumer that a mouse's head was found in one of Saeukkang's packaging. However,

not only concealed the report for a month before a formal investigation from the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety in Korea(MFDS) began but also the company did not recall their product. MFDS researched Nongshim's factories in

Busan Busan (), officially Busan Metropolitan City, is South Korea's second list of cities in South Korea by population, most populous city after Seoul, with a population of over 3.3 million as of 2024. Formerly romanized as Pusan, it is the economi ...

and

Qingdao Qingdao, Mandarin: , (Qingdao Mandarin: t͡ɕʰiŋ˧˩ tɒ˥) is a prefecture-level city in the eastern Shandong Province of China. Located on China's Yellow Sea coast, Qingdao was long an important fortress. In 1897, the city was ceded to G ...

and announced by April of the same year that they failed to find any problems with the manufacturing process. * In 2010, rice worms were found in Saeukkang, and MFDS drew a conclusion that rice worms were not from product production, but they were from processes of distribution to retail stores. * In 2019, Nongshim initially planned to stop using shrimp from Gunsan, South Korea for the production of Saeukkang due to sea pollution in Korea. As the company had been using shrimp from both the United States and South Korea, the company claimed that the Gunsan's shrimp quality had decreased since 48 years ago. However, due to protests and complaints from

Gunsan Gunsan (; ), also romanized as Kunsan, is a Administrative divisions of South Korea, city in North Jeolla Province, South Korea. It is on the south bank of the Geum River just upstream from its exit into the Yellow Sea. It has emerged as a high-t ...

fishermen and Congress, Nongshim decided to use the top 10% highest quality

shrimp.

References

External links

Nongshim Saeukkang's Official Website (USA)
{{Nongshim Brand name snack foods Food brands of South Korea Nongshim brands Products introduced in 1971 South Korean snack foods