From gym rat snack to lunch hour hack: How Korea became one of the world's biggest protein markets

Once a niche for gym-goers, protein bars, drinks and yogurts have entered the mainstream, with office workers, students, dieters and older consumers increasingly treating them as everyday food — and even lunch.

"I have to grab it while I can," said Kim Myung-jin, 28, at Bongeunsa Station in southern Seoul on Thursday morning. "Might as well take the low-fat choice, too."

Kim recently started a job in finance.

"It's been nearly a year since I started,” said Kim, adding with an anxious chuckle and a glance at the time, “And let’s just say I still have a long way to go to get a breakfast routine together.”

Mealification of snacks

Sometimes dubbed the mealification of snacks by Korean media, the shift is changing how a rice-centric food culture eats.

The evolution in eating habits is driving Korea into one of the world's fastest-growing markets for protein products, prompting established retailers and start-ups alike to churn out related goods. Traditional dairy companies such as Maeil and Namyang are being pushed out on falling demand for milk and infant formula as consumers pivot toward protein drinks.

Korea now ranks as the world's fifth-largest market for ready-to-drink protein beverages, according to the research firm Euromonitor International, up from 17th in 2020. The domestic ready-to-drink protein market reached 124.5 billion won ($81.4 million) last year after growing at an average of 81 percent a year over five years, far outpacing the 10 percent global rate, trailing only the United States, Japan, Britain and Germany.

The breadth of the Korean market is evident in the numbers. Korea's protein-food market grew from about 89 billion won in 2018 to roughly 450 billion won in 2023, a roughly fivefold expansion in five years, and the industry has projected it to reach about 800 billion won in 2026, according to the Korea Agro-Fisheries and Food Trade Corporation.

That pace far outstrips the global high-protein food market, which is growing at about 8 percent a year, and Korea's protein-supplement segment alone is forecast to expand at 10.8 percent annually through 2033, faster than the global rate of about 9 percent.

Trend bulks up

The market's origins tell the same story. Industry accounts date the broadening to 2018, when Maeil Dairies launched its Selex supplement aimed not at athletes but at middle-aged consumers worried about muscle loss, opening a nutrition market that health consciousness during the Covid-19 pandemic then accelerated. Namyang Dairy Products followed with its Take Fit brand in 2022, and the latecomer's bet has paid off, with revenue from the product jumping 72 percent on year in the first quarter of this year.

The audience has since widened, with demand now skewing toward younger consumers and women, with a concentration in low-sugar, plant-based and clean-label products, and surveys showing 34 percent of Korean protein buyers now opt for plant-based options.

At noon in the country's office districts, the change is visible. The lines outside the gukbap (rice soup) and kimchi stew restaurants are thinning, as workers chasing what is known as "God-saeng" — a productive, optimized life — open a protein bar at their desk or pair a protein drink with a cup of fruit before getting back to work.

Sales data reflects the shift. At 7-Eleven, sales in the first half of the year rose 48 percent from a year earlier for protein bars and 41 percent for yogurts, with gains of 19 percent for protein drinks and 8 percent for precut fruit, the company said, grouping the products under the mealification trend.

CU said its protein bar sales climbed 19.8 percent over the same period. GS Retail reported combined first-half growth of 12.9 percent for protein drinks and bars and 20.7 percent for protein breads and snacks. The categories posting the strongest growth are those suited to a quick lunch eaten outside a restaurant.

The power of protein

A category once associated mainly with fitness enthusiasts has become an everyday grocery segment, and its fastest-moving formats — the bar, the drink and the single-serving yogurt — are easily eaten at a desk. Lotte Wellfood's Easy Protein bars, launched in January 2024, sold three million units in three months, and Orion's Dr. You energy and protein bars have sold a cumulative 400 million units since their 2009 debut.

Retailers are also extending protein into staple Korean foods. GS Retail said its health-focused range, initially limited to drinks, has expanded into ice cream, desserts, sauces, breads and ready-to-eat meals. In May, GS25 introduced a high-protein gimbap (seaweed rice roll) series, including an egg-and-pollock roe-mayonnaise roll and a tuna-and-egg roll, adding protein content to one of the most familiar convenience store foods.

Snack makers now sell high-protein potato chips containing 12 grams (0.4 ounces) per bag, and protein-fortified breads, bean-and-tofu noodles and ice creams have followed, broadening the range of snack products positioned as meal replacements.

Convenience is a major draw. Younger workers increasingly treat the lunch hour as time to be reclaimed, eating in minutes and using the remainder for the gym or rest, and a protein bar or drink shortens the meal to something that can be finished in front of a keyboard.

Wellness is another, and it is changing what consumers count as a meal. A protein bar, Greek yogurt or a cup of fruit is perceived as a healthier choice than a heavier restaurant lunch. Moon Jung-hoon, a food business professor at Seoul National University, named "honwelsik," or solo wellness eating, the 2026 food trend keyword at an industry outlook hosted by the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs and the Korea Agro-Fisheries and Food Trade Corporation.

Analyzing three years of dining data, Moon found that while rice, soups and stews still ranked at the top, the form of the meal was changing quickly, with convenient, health-oriented one-bowl and one-hand foods becoming an everyday standard.

Cost seals it. A single dish at an office cafeteria now tops 7,000 won, and a restaurant lunch routinely exceeds 10,000 won, with the average price of a bowl of kalguksu (knife-cut noodles) in Seoul passing that mark in April. A protein bar or a convenience store snack costs a fraction of that.

"Lunch near my office is 12,000 won now,” a 30-year-old worker surnamed Lee said as he was entering the Digital Media City Station in Mapo District, western Seoul. “A protein drink and a gimbap are half that, and I don't feel guilty about it."

The pressure has fed a broader move away from restaurants, with the three major convenience chains reporting that sales of ready-made meals rose an average of about 32 percent on year in the first quarter of the year, and transactions in office districts between 11 a.m. and 1 p.m. up about 45 percent, according to the trade outlet Reportera. Protein snacks represent the health-oriented side of that shift.

BY KIM MIN-YOUNG [[email protected]]