In the year-end convenience store liquor market, the "G-Dragon (GD) effect" is spreading again. If CU led the boom in the first half of the year with the GD highball in collaboration with GD's fashion brand "Peaceminusone," this time GS25 has reignited IP competition over the GD effect by exclusively launching the GD beer "Daisy ale" using the same IP (intellectual property).
It is unusual in the liquor category for the same IP to conduct exclusive collaborations with different distributors by product line. In the retail and liquor industries, some say this case signals a split by platform and product line.
According to GS Retail, which operates GS25, on the 30th, the preorder sale of 888 sets of Daisy ale conducted on its app "Our Neighborhood GS" is continuing to sell out. Daisy ale is a beer created in collaboration with Peaceminusone and the Japanese beer brand "Hitachino Nest."
A GS Retail official said, "GD's global influence and the product strength of a premium brewery have come together. It is a product that can be expected to perform well in the long term, not just generate buzz." In fact, even before its official launch, Daisy ale became a hot topic among premium beer consumers and fandom communities.
The company that collaborated with GD before GS Retail was CU, a convenience store operated by BGF Retail. In the first half of the year, CU seized leadership in the highball market by scoring back-to-back hits with the "fresh fruit highball" series and the GD highball series. At the time, the GD highball series sold out as soon as it was released. CU's highball category sales increased by triple digits year over year, giving CU an edge in the highball market.
Industry watchers view this as the result of GD and Peaceminusone finding the best partners by item. A retail industry official said, "This year CU secured market influence by getting ahead of the highball trend, and GS25 has built experience through premium and craft beer collaborations and smart-order-based sales," adding, "Ultimately, while using the same IP, they chose the optimal partner for each product line."
Lee Jong-u, a professor of business administration at Ajou University, said, "With each convenience store strong in different items, what matters for a star IP with strong fandom spending is 'which item will deliver the greatest effect,'" adding, "To ensure continuity through follow-up models and expansion strategies, rather than a 'flash success,' it is important to pair with the optimal platform."
Some also see this case as a signal that IP-based liquor collaboration structures are shifting from exclusivity to "project-based" arrangements. A retail industry official said, "An exclusive structure that concentrates on a specific distributor inevitably limits a brand's expansion," adding, "Instead, finding the optimal platform for each item and target has become an important strategy."
A liquor industry official said, "It is uncommon for the same IP to exclusively launch different products at two convenience store chains in the same year," while adding, "Highballs and premium beers tend not to overlap in consumer base, so this was actually the optimal choice to cover both the highball and beer markets."