Protesters at Gwanghwamun Square in central Seoul condemn Shinsegae Group Chairman Chung Yong-jin for his lack of apologetic commitments following Starbucks Korea's "Tank Day" marketing debacle last month and demand a shutdown of the cafe chain in Korea, May 27. Yonhap
Shinsegae Group Chairman Chung Yong-jin will sit for a “history lesson” after the conglomerate’s Starbucks Korea rattled the country last month with its controversial “Tank Day” tumbler marketing campaign, which provoked democracy supporters and victims of the bloody crackdowns on key pro-democracy uprisings against a military junta in the 1980s.
Shinsegae said on Monday that Chung will sit for a lecture on June 24, together with presidents of the group's nearly 50 subsidiaries. The lesson will be in two parts, covering historical consciousness and social sensitivity, delivered by professors from Sungkyunkwan University’s departments of history and sociology.
Executives of Emart, which runs Starbucks Korea operator SCK Company, will hear the same lectures on Wednesday. Shop managers of over 2,110 Starbucks cafes in Korea will hear it on Monday.
To accommodate the class, the company will close all Starbucks at 3 p.m. on the day of the lecture for shop managers on Monday. The brand has never closed early here since it first opened in the country in 1999.
