GS25 said on Saturday that a promotional exhibition for its fresh-food pre-order service, "Fresh Reservation", on the "WooridongneGS" app recorded 20,000 cumulative orders in January and February.

Fresh Reservation is an event that sells fresh foods, such as seasonal items that are difficult for regular convenience stores to carry, through app-based pre-orders. Fresh-food sales generated through the app grew 540 percent from a year earlier.

GS25 started the pre-order service as a way to overcome space constraints while widening customer choice. It said the order-based model allows it to offer products at reasonable prices, and it judged there would be demand among consumers who prefer shopping close to home.

Fresh-food categories such as meat, seafood and fruit sold evenly. Top-selling items included Korean pork belly, air-shipped salmon fillet, smoked duck slices with five "no" claims, Korean pork shoulder, and California mandarins.

Customers were 28.4 percent in their 20s, 38.2 percent in their 30s, 22.8 percent in their 40s and 10.6 percent aged 50 and older. Customers in their 20s and 30s accounted for about 70 percent. The company viewed the rapidly rising number of one-person households and a trend toward nearby grocery shopping as having influenced wider use of the service.

GS25 plans to keep expanding its lineup of smaller-portion products for one-person households and fresh foods of strong quality, based on its sourcing capabilities and network. It is also increasing fresh-specialty stores in residential areas, known as FCS, to strengthen category competitiveness. It will also work this year to bolster nearby fresh-food competitiveness through the Fresh Reservation service based on online-for-offline, or O4O.

Dae-young Kim (김대영), a manager in GS Retail's O4O division, said, "The Fresh Reservation promotion is a new attempt to provide customers with a variety of fresh foods beyond the space limitations of convenience stores." He added, "Going forward, we will continue to expand customer benefits by offering fresh foods such as 'day' events and seasonal items at reasonable prices in line with timing."