K-food fever grips Indian brands: McDonald’s, Maggi, Knorr, Wendy’s lead the wave
Indian brands are embracing the Korean wave with K-food launches—from McDonald’s and Maggi to Knorr and Wendy’s—backed by K-pop-inspired ads, influencers, and drama-style storytelling
New Delhi: Fuelled by the global rise of K-pop idols, binge-worthy K-dramas, and viral K-beauty routines, the Korean wave—or Hallyu—is shaping more than just entertainment and skincare trends.
Now, it’s influencing what’s on the menu. Tapping into this pop culture phenomenon, brands in India are increasingly embracing K-food, adding Korean flavours like gochujang, kimchi, and bulgogi to appeal to Gen Z and millennial consumers.
To deepen their connect with pop culture-savvy audiences, brands riding the Korean wave aren't just tweaking their menus—they’re also borrowing cues from Korean-style storytelling and aesthetics in their marketing. From ad campaigns inspired by K-drama tropes to influencer tie-ups that echo the style of K-pop idols, brands are using music, visuals, and digital storytelling to make their K-food offerings more aspirational.
McDonald’s India introduced its limited-time offering Korean range, including Korean McAloo Tikki Burger, Korean Chicken Surprise Burger, Korean McSpicy Chicken Burger, Korean McSpicy, among others.
The company also launched its Korean Spice Mix. The brand offers a Korean combo starting at Rs 69.
To push the range, the company launched its ‘Your favourites but make it Korean’ campaign.
Along with a K-drama themed campaign and promotional content, McDonald’s collaborated with several social media influencers such as Anushka Sen, Cha Jaeil aka Pyara Jake Kodia, Jiwon Park aka Korean G1, Sakshma Srivastav and Shweta Salian.
McDonald’s India - North and East is also determined to benefit from the K-fever with its latest Korean Spicy Range.
To promote the range McDonald’s has released an anime-style campaign film. The new Korean range incorporates Gochujang sauce, a mix of spice and sugar, and umami.
The chain has also launched the Korean Yuzu-Fizz Drink.
Following the trend, Burger King launched its Korean Spicy Fest, a limited-time menu offering Korean Spicy Paneer Burger, Korean Spicy Chicken Burger, and Korean Spicy Chicken Pieces, Wings and Fries.
Burger King launched a campaign featuring digital promotions, in-restaurant activations, OOH advertising, and influencer partnerships to promote the range.
Additionally, the company also planned multiple user-generated content contests on their social media handles.
Watch the campaign:
Nestlé Maggi launched its Korean BBQ Veg and Chicken Noodles to join the trend. The company collaborated with actress Khushi Kapoor to launch an ad film wherein Maggi Korean Noodles launches Khushi Kapoor, instead of the other way round.
Apart from the ad film, the company collaborated with social media influencers such as Chahat Tewani, Harshita Gupta, Anushka Sen, Piyusha Patil, and blogger The Lost Foodie, for the Maggi Korean Challenge.
Along with paid partnerships, the company partnered with the cafe and bar Social and the platform ScoopWhoop to further push the product launch.
Maggi isn’t the only brand offering Korean noodles to consumers. The company’s competitor, HUL Knorr, launched its K-Culture campaign offering Korean noodle bowls with flavours such as Kimchi, Jjajangmyeon and Gochujang Chicken.
The company launched the Dare to Slurp challenge in collaboration with Netflix’s Squid Game Season 2 to promote the newly launched range.
Consumers could scan a QR code present in their Knorr Korean Ramen pack to enter the challenge, earn points by slurping and win an all-expense-paid trip to Seoul.
To amplify the campaign digitally, the company utilised collaborations with influencers and creators.
Knorr partnered with creators including Abhijeet Kain, Karan Sonawane, Viraj Ghelani, Bhagyashree Limaye, Varun Grover and others.
ITC Bingo! refused to miss out on the trend, launching Bingo! 2X Hot and Spicy Korean-style chips and Bingo! Hot and Spicy Korean Nachos.
To amplify the launch Bingo! collaborated with South Korean singer Aoora, for a song - Maeun Maeun, which means Spicy, Spicy in Korean.
The music video was conceptualised and developed by Tonic Worldwide. The campaign aimed to combine the craze for K-pop and K-food.
The brand utilised relevant K-pop and Gen Z music lineups across platforms like Spotify and YouTube. It further aimed to leverage music channels to position the song as engaging content.
Promotional spots featuring the song were placed across movie, music, and general entertainment channels.
The brand has also partnered with approximately 15 influencers across regions, including Korean influencers in India, Indian influencers in Korea and food vloggers.
Listen to the song:
Most recently, Wendy’s, in partnership with Rebel Foods, launched its Korean range of burgers, wraps, and sides.
The lineup includes the Korean Fried Chicken Burger, Kimchi Nuggets, and Kimchi Tenders.
The launch campaign spanned a mix of content formats using heat as the hook.
The company used collaboration with food vloggers, Anime-style storytelling, ASMR and Mukbang content, platform-native reels and memes to promote the launch.
There is a question of how much authenticity and originality lie in the flavours offered by the companies. Additionally, brands are riding the Korean wave, but it will be interesting to see whether the saturation will bore the consumers or the trend will stay.
/bmi/media/agency_attachments/KAKPsR4kHI0ik7widvjr.png)
/bmi/media/media_files/2025/05/09/zQkAa9yJJa8Wxohv8s69.jpg)
Follow Us/bmi/media/media_files/2025/04/17/HIR2u1jw16w34wBZxeAm.jpg)