Burger Landing
While O'Connor Burger was holding its food truck event, we met the Hwaan Group people at the hotel.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you. I’m Hur Kyung-seok of Hwaan F&B.”
“Hello. I’m Han Miru.”
Heo Min-woong greeted Sean O'Connor first.
“Long time no see. Thank you for making the trip all the way to Korea.”
“Not at all. I’ve wanted to visit Korea for a long time. I’m glad I had a good reason to come.”
“I’ll do my best to grow the business here.”
“Then I look forward to working with you.”
Though the contract was technically being signed by President Hur Kyung-seok of Hwaan F&B, it was Heo Min-woong who was steering the room. And no one found that strange.
Then Heo Min-woong turned to Trish and greeted her.
“Hello. I’m Trish O'Connor, reporter for WST.”
“A pleasure. I’m Heo Min-woong. It’s finally nice to meet you in person.”
It was their first time meeting face-to-face, but the two of them were hardly strangers.
Trish had exposed the truth behind Thomas Motors at the PureCell Day event, and the person who had gone out of his way to make sure she could attend was none other than Heo Min-woong.
Soon after that, she had even interviewed him by phone.
“I’ve been enjoying your articles. I’ve heard a lot about you through Miru, but meeting you in person, you’re even more beautiful than I was told.”
“Oh, really?”
“Of course. I’m not the type who can lie.”
Perhaps because he thought of her as one of his people, his attitude was extremely respectful.
“Would you be free for an interview later?”
“Of course.”
Heo Min-woong handed her his business card.
“If you have any questions, just contact me here anytime.”
Just from the fact that he was hosting a food truck event, it was obvious that employee training had already been completed and store opening preparations were underway.
The preliminary agreement had been settled in secret long ago, and today’s final contract was little more than a formality for the outside world.
Heo Min-woong looked at us and said, “Everything’s been prepared on our side. Let’s go inside.”
* * *
Hwaan F&B has signed an agreement with O'Connor Burger Inc. regarding the domestic business rights contract.
The two companies each invested 50 percent to establish O'Connor Burger Korea.
O'Connor Burger Korea is the exclusive operator in Korea and has the right to recruit franchisees and conduct business independently from the U.S. headquarters.
O'Connor Burger is a famous franchise that was even chosen as the hamburger Americans loved most in a recent New York Times survey.
At present, it has stores only in the United States, and Korea is its first overseas market.
There is an interesting story behind how O'Connor Burger, which began at a pub in New York, became beloved by Americans.
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All of O'Connor Burger’s menu items are made fresh with ingredients delivered that same day.
Customers can taste its distinctive flavor in the patties and sauces made in-house, the potato buns, and the orange juice made only from California oranges.
Along with President Hur Kyung-seok’s efforts, Hwaan Energy Vice President Heo Min-woong is said to have played a major role in bringing O'Connor Burger to Korea.
Calling himself a burger enthusiast, he visited O'Connor Burger locations whenever he was on business trips to the United States, then met with the relevant parties and persuaded them.
He also built trust steadily with founder and CEO Sean O'Connor, and even succeeded in moving the founder’s heart by personally presenting the business plan.
In this way, Vice President Heo Min-woong took a leading role throughout the entire process, from negotiations to contract signing.
Thanks to his efforts, Hwaan F&B beat out strong competitors and won the Korean business rights for O'Connor Burger.
Hwaan F&B said it plans to open more than ten stores in Korea within the next year. Vice President Heo Min-woong expressed strong confidence, saying preparations for that expansion had already been completed.
Sean O'Connor, CEO of O'Connor Burger, said, “Our top priority is making great food and letting people around the world enjoy it. I’m very happy that Korea is the first country to share in that goal. Hwaan F&B is the best partner to bring our passion to Korea,” expressing his trust in the company.
* * *
Heo Min-woong had always been a public figure.
The first time he really made his name known to the public was when he got drunk at a club and started a mass brawl.
He even punched out the guards who tried to stop him, then proudly announced at the police station that he was the second son of the Hwaan Group chairman.
The incident sparked a wave of negative public sentiment toward chaebols, and Chairman Heo Seong-hun even bowed his head in apology, saying he was sorry for raising his son so badly.
But after that, he kept showing up in the news every so often with various assault and drunk driving incidents.
If things had ended there, people would have remembered him only as a spoiled chaebol brat.
But the twist came afterward.
He saved Hwaan Energy during the Thomas Motors fraud scandal.
While Hwaan Solution, which had failed to respond in time, fell hard, Hwaan Energy later partnered with Nextrigen and went from strength to strength.
It always drew more attention when someone who had been a total mess suddenly started doing well than when a person who had always been competent simply kept being competent.
Because of that episode, Heo Min-woong firmly established a public image as a man with a turnaround story.
So when it was announced that he had succeeded in bringing O'Connor Burger to Korea for the first time outside the United States, people cheered.
— Wow! Heo Min-woong is amazing~
— Ooooh! Thanks, Min-woong hyung!
* * *
When Heo Min-hong saw the articles, he crumpled the documents in his hand.
Every media outlet kept running daily stories as if bringing in a burger franchise were some enormous achievement.
“Just bringing in a burger franchise...”
But Heo Min-hong understood better than anyone that it wasn’t just that.
Hwaan F&B was weak in the franchise business, which was why its most likely partner for this deal had originally been New Century Foods.
And yet Heo Min-woong stepped in and won the rights himself.
It’s thanks to his connection with Han Miru.
That was the real point.
In other words, Heo Min-woong had made possible what was supposed to be impossible.
That, in turn, showed that Continue Capital would be able to do all kinds of business with them going forward.
The press and shareholders had noticed that too.
No matter how successful the O'Connor Burger franchise became, it would still not generate huge profits compared with Hwaan Group’s other businesses.
But as this event showed, the company would likely be able to hold all kinds of future events with Continue Capital.
And every time that happens, Heo Min-woong’s name will come up too.
Public perception is power in its own right.
The reason chaebols can get away with monstrous scandals and still walk free on probation is that everyone believes they can.
If enough people started thinking of Heo Min-woong first when they thought of Hwaan Group, then that would become the reality.
Until now, Heo Min-hong had never imagined that his younger brother would threaten his position.
Whenever his brother caused trouble, he would act worried on the outside while secretly feeling pleased, because every incident pushed Heo Min-woong farther out of his father’s favor and farther from the center of the group.
But now the situation had changed.
Heo Min-hong clenched his fist tightly.
I can’t just sit still.
He would have to come up with some kind of countermeasure.
* * *
Because preparations for the opening had already been underway for some time, O'Connor Burger Korea’s first store opened immediately after the final contract was signed.
The location of the first store was none other than Yuseong Town in Gangnam.
The reason they chose Yuseong Town instead of the busier Gangnam-daero, with all its foot traffic, was simple: we were the ones who had to eat there, along with the employees.
That, too, was part of Continue Capital’s employee welfare.
As soon as word of the opening got out, people began lining up the night before. Some even brought folding chairs and blankets, as if they were camping.
By the time opening hour approached, the line had grown so long it wrapped around Yuseong Town.
Senior Dong-ho clicked his tongue at the sight.
“All this over one hamburger.”
“It’s O'Connor Burger.”
“I expected it would be popular when I had it in the States, but I never thought it’d be this extreme.”
“Right?”
If I hadn’t seen the article during my first life, I would have been just as shocked.
Since this was O'Connor Burger’s first overseas branch, the media frenzy was intense as well.
Every major domestic outlet had shown up, and several foreign press crews were there covering the scene too. Among them was WST’s temporary Korea correspondent, Trish O'Connor.
Trish took photos and interviewed the citizens waiting in line.
“What time did you start waiting yesterday?”
“Huh? Huh?”
The man sitting in a camping chair looked completely flustered when a gorgeous woman suddenly spoke to him in English.
Since Trish couldn’t speak Korean, I translated for her from the side.
Then the man answered.
“Since 8 p.m.”
“Where are you from?”
“I came from Jeju.”
Trish looked stunned.
“So you flew here?”
I was shocked too.
He’d come up from Jeju the day before just to eat O'Connor Burger!
The man himself seemed to think nothing of it.
“Yes. There’s a famous tonkatsu place right in front of my house. People in Seoul fly in just to eat that one tonkatsu, then pitch tents and camp out in front of it. It’s the same thing.”
“...”
When he put it that way, it was the same in a sense, but wasn’t both of it ridiculous?
He wasn’t the only one who had come from far away. From Daejeon, Daegu, Gwangju, Busan, and everywhere else, people had come up from all over the country to eat O'Connor Burger.
“Going to Seoul is closer than going to America.”
“I hope they open a store in Busan too, someday.”
“It’s the hamburger that got famous in Silicon Valley, so I’ve always wanted to try it.”
“I had it once on a business trip, and I couldn’t forget the taste, so I came back.”
Trish looked at me and asked, “You said you opened the first store here because Miru wanted to eat it, right?”
“That’s right.”
“At this rate, will you even get to eat any?”
“Hmm...”
There had to be some kind of first-shareholder reservation system, right?
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