Samyang Foods plans health food business expansion

The Jack & Pulse protein drop. [Courtesy of Samyang Foods Co.]

Samyang Foods Co., the company behind the globally popular “Buldak” spicy chicken stir-fried noodles, is set to significantly expand its health food business in a strategic move to reduce its single-product reliance and introduce new hit products.

According to industry sources on Thursday, Samyang Foods plans to launch plant-based frozen snacks aimed at single-person households by June 2024 or August at the latest. These new products will be part of the Jack & Pulse brand, which was launched earlier in the year and is based on soy protein. The Jack & Pulse lineup currently only includes protein beverages, but the company is in the initial stages of expanding the line into the beverage, nutrition, and diet sectors.

“We plan to extend the Jack & Pulse brand from its current protein beverage offerings to include home meal replacement (HMR) products. Unlike existing HMRs that target households of two to three people, our new snack-form food will cater to single-person households, making it easy to consume anywhere,” said a company spokesperson.

In addition to the South Korean market, Samyang Foods aims to take its export brand “Tangle,” a dried noodle product designed for Western markets, to the premium level by rebranding and repositioning it as a health food to better meet local demand by the end of 2024. Tangle was initially launched in North America June 2023 and has since expanded to Japan a few months later. The company plans to expand the product’s reach even further to Europe, Oceania, and the Middle East.

This strategic shift comes on the heels of impressive financial performance, which was largely driven by the global popularity of the Buldak series., Samyang Foods reported a revenue of 385.7 billion won ($283 million) in the first quarter of 2024, up over 57 percent from a year ago.