The client
Honglim Yu is a Master Artisan of Korean cuisine, Burgundy's ambassador for Korean gastronomy and the fourth generation of her family to ferment. She now does it at Château de Devay, on 25 hectares in rural France.
Kimchi Château sells her kimchi, gochujang and other ferments by the jar, made with no sugar and no preservatives. It also runs Korean food workshops at the château.
The problem
Korean food made in Burgundy sounds like a gimmick until you know who is making it. Every shopper arrives with the same quiet question: is Korean food made in France the real thing?
The store also had to run two businesses from one shopfront. Someone buying gochujang and someone booking a Kimjang masterclass want completely different journeys.
- Korean authenticity is doubted by default in France.
- Jars and château workshops had to live in one store.
- Nine products sat across two distinct ranges.
- Small artisan batches sell out.
- No sugar and no preservatives deserved to be said loudly.
What we built
The brief was to answer the authenticity question before the first scroll ends, and to keep the two businesses out of each other's way. So the store leads with her, not the jars.
I built it as a Shopify store development project on Shopify's native stack plus one booking tool. A small producer can manage stock and workshops without a developer.
- Provenance up front. Four generations, Master Artisan and regional ambassador are stated before the first product.
- Two businesses, one store. Jars and château workshops each get their own route from the same homepage.
- Two collections. The range is split into Château and Héritage, so nine products are easy to scan.
- Filter by availability and price. Small batches sell out, so shoppers can narrow the list to what is actually on the shelf.
- Workshops book online. Koalendar handles ten workshop formats, from kimchi making to the Kimjang Masterclass, with no email back and forth.
The result
The provenance does the selling. Fourth generation, Master Artisan, regional ambassador: three facts that turn "Korean food from France" from odd into rare.
Ten workshops now book through Koalendar without an email exchange. And a €49 free shipping threshold does its quiet work on basket size.
A maker's story is often the strongest thing a small food producer has. Putting it first, then making the buying simple, is how I approach online stores for food brands.
Stack
- Shopify
- Koalendar
