Discussing next year’s minimum wage increase rate
Industry fears that labor costs will increase
Based on technology, speed to unmanned conversion
Unmannedness is becoming a daily life. With the preference for non-face-to-face transactions due to the novel coronavirus infection (Corona 19), the unmanned wind that started at convenience stores and marts is expanding not only in cafes and restaurants, but also in all types of businesses. This phenomenon is expected to become even more severe next year due to the burden of the minimum wage.
On the 21st, workers members of the Minimum Wage Committee held a press conference before the 5th plenary meeting and submitted an initial request of 10,890 won to the Minimum Wage Council. This is 1730 won (18.9%) more than the minimum wage (9,160 won) this year. Converted to a monthly salary (applied to 209 working hours per month), it is 2,276,010 won.
Business circles are arguing that the minimum wage for next year should be frozen at the current 9,160 won, while labor circles are of the view that next year’s minimum wage should be 10,000 won or more. With the legal deadline for the minimum wage review approaching on the 29th, the minimum wage will reflect inflation, economic growth, and employment growth.
The weighting of the labor cost burden has become a factor that further promotes the speed of unmanned work. Officials say that although the government’s social distancing policy has had a major impact over the past two years, there are many reasons for the increase in the minimum wage. Since there are no permanent staff, labor cost savings are significant.
In particular, from the standpoint of the self-employed, unmanned stores have various attractive factors. You can maximize your profits, and you can be free from staff training and management problems. As technological evolution is supported, the limitations of manpower are rapidly being replaced.
Currently, the most unmanned place in the retail industry is convenience stores. Convenience stores have been actively promoting unmanned stores. Hybrid (unmanned at night) stores that have clerks during the day and operate unmanned at night have been increased. Currently, about 2400 convenience stores in Korea are this store.
The introduction of unmanned convenience stores is focused on enhancing the operational power of franchisees. Since most of them work in a one-person system, it started with the question, “How can I reduce the work of the store owner without loss of manpower?” 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, the reason for maintaining the convenience store business also played a part.
A view of the stand of ‘Pick & Joy’, an unmanned sales platform exclusively for takeout in the cafeteria in Bundang, Seongnam, operated by Our Home. ⓒOur HomeA wind of unmanned food is blowing in the restaurant franchise industry as well. Kiosk service, which is a non-face-to-face ordering method, is a representative example. Recently, unmanned vending machines are being introduced in cafeterias, and robots are used to make and serve food, and the number of unmanned calculators is rapidly increasing.
Lotteria, operated by Lotte GRS, opened an unmanned store ‘Lotteria L7 Hongdae Branch’ last year. This store is operated in such a way that, when you order a menu from a kiosk, a robot immediately manufactures it, and customers directly receive the product with a receipt barcode.
Recently, the number of unmanned ice cream shops is also increasing remarkably. In 2017, there were only 880, but recently, there were 4,000. An official explained that unmanned products are being made quickly because of the advantage of easy inventory management as it is a frozen product.
Regardless of the type of business, the introduction of unmanned vending machines is also accelerating. Beyond simple sweets and convenience food vending machines, unmanned sales of alcoholic beverages, which were difficult to sell at unmanned stores due to adult authentication, have recently begun. In Korea, the convenience store industry introduced an unmanned liquor vending machine for the first time last year.
The era has come when people do not even deliver. Domino’s Pizza commercialized a drone delivery service in Sejong City last August. The drone delivery service can be used when ordering delivery from the official Domino Pizza application, selecting Domino Spot, and then designating Sejong Lake Park, a domino spot for drones.
In addition, Kyochon F&B opened the 8th Tool Store in Songdo, Kyochon Chicken, where cooperative robots were introduced last year. BBQ introduced the self-driving robot ‘Foodbot’ to a store near Helio City, a large apartment complex in Songpa-gu, Seoul, and CJ Foodville is operating a serving robot at the Seoul Station Branch of Jeiljemyunso, a noodle specialty store.
Industry insiders predict that this trend will intensify in the future. This is because technology is evolving more and more sophisticatedly, and as more and more self-employed people close their businesses due to the burden of labor costs, efforts to make up for difficulties in sales and operating losses are continuing.
An official from the franchise industry said, “As labor costs rise significantly, efforts to significantly lower the minimum number of people when starting a restaurant business are increasing. Efforts are increasing.”
He added, “It is expected that the franchise model, which mainly focuses on delivery and packaging, will expand significantly in the future.”
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