▲ Mayor of Boryeong, who is promoting the city’s agricultural specialty produce in the USA

Boryeong in Chungcheongnam-do, hometown of the global mud festival, has started to promote its mud festival and agricultural specialty produce in LA, USA in order to realize “American Dream,” the brand of excellent agricultural produce.

Boryeong organized a private-government visitor group consisting of 9 people and Mayor Kim Dong-il. They visited LA, where many Korean Americans reside, for 7 days beginning November 5. They also conducted promotional activities through the local mass media and visited six Zion Markets.

Through the promotional activities in Zion Markets, which are being operated in LA and San Diego, Boryeong publicized the excellence of its agricultural specialty produce and promoted itself through broadcast interviews via Radio Korea.

There are six Zion Markets in LA. They are employing 610 workers, with some 23,000 customers using the markets daily. The markets are representative Korean markets recording 240.9 billion won in sales yearly. The group had a live interview at Radio Korea and sold specialty produce at the Buena Park Store of Zion Market.

Mayor Kim personally promoted the sale of the city’s agricultural specialty produce, and many customers came to Zion Market to purchase high-quality agricultural specialty produce at low prices.

At the market, Boryeong sold some 54 products in 12 categories such as rice, seasoned laver, grains, and dried vegetables and held a tasting event as well. It also offered mud soap and seasoned laver as a giveaway gift to customers depending on the amount of purchase.

“The specialty produce was a popular corner in our market, and our customers showed great interest in the promotional activities held by the visiting team. We recorded the highest sales in one day thanks to Boryeong’s excellent agricultural specialty produce,” a representative of Buena Park Store said.

Boryeong plans to expand the export of its agricultural specialty produce by conducting promotional activities among non-Korean residents in LA, in addition to Korean Americans.

In addition, the city plans to recruit LA Radio Korea Chairperson Kim Hong-su as promotional ambassador to promote Boryeong Mud Festival actively among Americans.

“We decided to visit LA to increase the brand value of Boryeong’s excellent agricultural specialty produce and to improve export sales through local promotional activities. We will do our best to advance into the international market by exporting our excellent products and to revitalize local agriculture, which will lead to an income increase for famers,” Mayor Kim Dong-il said.

Boryeong has been directly exporting agricultural specialty produce worth 700 million dollars to the USA since December 2007 after signing an MOU with Zion Market for the distribution of agricultural specialty produce. Recording growth in export every year, it targets 800 million dollars in sales this year.