Starbucks Korea to shut stores for history lessons after ‘Tank Day’ furore

Starbucks stores in South Korea will close early next week so employees can receive history instruction after a botched marketing campaign triggered a public backlash, the US coffee chain’s local operator says.

The move comes after Starbucks Korea provoked a furore last month with a marketing campaign that evoked one of the most painful chapters in the country’s march to democracy.

The coffee giant’s use of the wording “Tank Day” and “5/18” to promote a range of coffee tumblers outraged South Koreans by evoking a military crackdown on May 18, 1980, against a pro-democracy uprising in Gwangju.

Starbucks Korea CEO Son Jung-hyun was fired over his role in the PR disaster, which Starbucks’s global headquarters said was “unintentional” but “never should have happened”.

In a statement on Monday, Starbucks Korea operator Shinsegae Group said all outlets nationwide will close at 3pm (06:00 GMT) on Monday next week so employees can participate in “historical awareness and social sensitivity” training.

Shinsegae Group said the move will mark the first time that stores have shut early all at once across the country since Starbucks launched in South Korea in 1999.

Shinsegae Group Chairman Chung Yong-jin and top executives will separately undergo training on Wednesday, the retail conglomerate said.

“The move is intended to take the incident as a lesson and prevent similar cases from recurring across the group in the future,” Shinsegae Group said.

The Gwangju Uprising was a major catalyst in the democratisation of South Korea, which held its first free elections in decades in 1987 after a succession of military-led administrations.

Led by student protesters opposed to the rule of military strongman Chun Doo-hwan, the democratisation movement was violently crushed when Chun deployed the military to retake control of the southwestern city.

Government figures put the death toll at more than 200 people, but activists and historians have estimated the true figure to be more than 2,000.

South Korea is home to more than 2,000 Starbucks outlets, making the country the second biggest overseas market for the Seattle-based chain after China.