South Korean confectionery brand Orion group on Wednesday responded to a price hike in China after Chinese consumers found out that the brand’s choco pies in China are increasing in price despite using inferior ingredients.
The topic quickly began trending on China’s Twitter like social media Sina Weibo with over 100 million of views and 10,000 discussions as of press time.
This comes after the brand was caught in controversy after Chinese netizens found it only lifted prices in China and Russia and chose to use inferior cacao powder in Chinese market. Orion is continuing to use pure cocoa powder in other overseas markets.
In response, Orion said on its official Weibo account that prices of its products in Chinese market were largely unchanged over recent years.
The company only adjusted prices of some pie products that were heavily affected by the rise in raw material last September, while the prices of other products, such as puffs, biscuits and sweets, remained unchanged, the brand said.
The brand said it adopts different price adjustment in different countries as the rising cost of raw materials and labor cost vary across geographies.
For Chinese customers, prices of four pie snacks including Choco Pies and Q Di Pies have increased by some 6 to 10 percent while in Russia, prices of all Orion products rose by an average 7 percent starting last October, according to media reports.
In response to the controversy over using poorer quality ingredients in China, Orion said that the main ingredients used in its products are the same worldwide, and the controversy was caused by the inaccurate translation of the ingredients list of overseas products.
Orion entered Chinese market in 1995 and registered in Langfang in North China’s Hebei Province.
The company has grown into a comprehensive food enterprise with annual sales of more than 6 billion yuan ($950 million) across seven categories and channels throughout the country, according to the company’s website.
photo: web
