Investigators with the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency’s special detective unit searched Starbucks Korea’s headquarters in Seoul’s Centerfield building on Wednesday to secure materials tied to how the company had planned its “Tank Day” marketing campaign, the first compulsory search since a civic group and victims’ families filed criminal complaints two months ago.
Starbucks Korea ran a tumbler promotion from May 15 to 26, branded “Tank Day” for May 18, the anniversary of the 1980 Gwangju uprising, when South Korea’s military dictatorship crushed a pro-democracy protest with tanks and paratroopers, killing at least 165 civilians.
Materials referenced “5/18” directly, and one line of ad copy described the “sound” of setting a tumbler on a desk, phrasing that echoed the police’s own discredited explanation for the 1987 death of student activist Park Jong-chul, whom interrogators tortured to death and falsely claimed had simply gasped and collapsed after someone slammed a desk. That cover-up helped ignite the protests that forced South Korea’s democratization.
Starbucks Korea pulled the campaign within hours and later disclosed it had used AI tools to develop the materials without adequate historical review.
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Shinsegae Inc. (KRX: 004170), which controls Starbucks Korea through its retail arm, fired then-CEO Son Jung-hyun within days. Chairman Chung Yong-jin bowed publicly and asked forgiveness from victims’ families, and President Lee Jae-myung condemned the campaign on social media, asking, “Out of what twisted resentment did they commit such an act?”
In June, the company closed all roughly 2,000 of its Korean stores early for mandatory history training, its first such closure since entering the market in 1999.
Starbucks Corp. (Nasdaq: SBUX) hasn’t owned any stake in the business since selling its remaining share in 2021 to E-Mart and Singapore’s GIC fund, yet its Seattle headquarters still apologized, calling the episode unintentional but one that “never should have happened.”
Three of five staffers who planned the promotion wouldn’t hand over their phones, and routine data-retention rules had already erased key internal messages by the time investigators asked. Police first sought a warrant on June 8, but prosecutors rejected it, saying Starbucks Korea was already cooperating. Wednesday’s search followed a renewed request. Investigators are now trying to determine whether the campaign’s timing was intentional, a question that could bring criminal charges for insult or defamation.
When CNN asked police to confirm the raid was tied to the case, officers instead cited security preparations for next week’s Liberation Day holiday and declined to elaborate.
E-Mart Inc. (KRX: 139480) controls 67.5% of Starbucks Korea, one of the coffee chain’s largest markets outside the United States and China.
