Six cafes within 200 feet

Six cafes within 200 feet

Six cafes within 200 feet

Six cafes within 200 feet

Six cafes within 200 feet

Six cafes within 200 feet

South Korea Has a Coffee Shop Problem

By Pablo Robles and John Yoon

Dec. 3, 2025

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“If I could start over,” said Ko Jang-su, “I would do anything but open a cafe.”

Mr. Ko’s cafe is one of the busiest coffee shops in his densely populated neighborhood of Seoul. Still, on weekday mornings it sits empty.

It is not hard to understand why: Mr. Ko has more than 50 competitors nearby, and in South Korea, that is hardly unusual. In Seoul, the density of cafes rivals that of Paris.

The passion for coffee — one national survey suggested that Koreans now reach for it more often than rice — has bred a fantasy among some hoping to cash in and escape the 9-to-5 grind: Why not open a cafe of their own?

The trend caught on fast, as trends often do in South Korea. Thousands of coffee shops open each year. But just as quickly, thousands disappear.

When Mr. Ko opened his cafe in the Sillim neighborhood of southern Seoul in 2016, the competition wasn’t as stiff. There were just two other coffee shops within a few hundred feet.