An advertisement for Oriental Brewery's new collaboration of sparkling liquor FiLGOOD with the London Fruit & Herb Company / Courtesy of Oriental Brewery

By Kim Jae-heun

Food and beverage companies are adopting a distinctive marketing strategy of collaborating with other industry players to attract Korea's Generation MZ consumers ― millennials and Generation Z ― according to company officials, Monday.

Collaborations between companies allow them to offer unique products and services that many millennials would not hesitate to pay for ― even if the prices are a little higher. Such collaborations also create synergies between brands.

Oriental Brewery (OB) recently introduced a new sparkling liquor in collaboration with Britain's London Fruit & Herb Company.

The product includes tea bags in four fruit flavors and OB's sparkling liquor, FiLGOOD, which comes in a 500-milliliter-size can. Consumers can choose to mix the different tea flavors into the alcohol beverage to their taste. The product is only available at GS25 convenience stores in Seoul for now.

"We have introduced a new collaboration with London Fruit & Herb Company to attract young customers with unique tastes. We will continue to reflect rapidly changing trends in the market and strengthen our communication with the MZ generation," an OB official said.

CJ CheilJedang has also launched four different cup rice items in collaboration with Krafton. The product has popular characters from online video game Battlegrounds as part of the products' package designs. There is an e-coupon inside the cup box, which customers can use as virtual currency in the game.

"We collaborated with the game company to find new ways to communicate with the MZ generation, which pursues both entertainment and consumption at the same time. We will keep introducing new products and event promotions tailored to young consumers' preferences," a CJ CheilJedang official said.

Food firm Paldo collaborated with the popular mobile phone game, Crazyracing Kartrider, to launch four flavors of the sparkling drink, Bbu Yo Soda, two months ago. Bbu Yo Soda was discontinued 24 years ago, but Paldo brought it back to capture the attention of young consumers.