▲ Mr. Kim cutting ice
"In the old days, the freezers would be packed with ice all the way up to the ceiling, forcing us to squeeze inside. But now, as you can see, they are completely empty."
On August 3, inside an ice shop at Seokbawi Market in Michuhol-gu, Incheon, where heatwave warnings had continued for over ten days.
In front of the 33-square-meter shop sat handcarts and motorcycles used for ice delivery, while the interior featured ice-cutting machinery and a small freezer of about 10 square meters maintained at minus 11 degrees Celsius.
Inside the freezer, 25-kilogram blocks of crushed ice in white sacks and 17-kilogram bags of ice packaged in green and orange plastic bags were neatly lined up.
However, spaces here and there were visibly empty in an interior space that should have been packed with ice during the height of summer.
Kim, a 58-year-old who has been selling ice to market merchants and others at this location for 19 years, broke out in beads of sweat despite the chilly air blasting from the freezer every time he opened its door.
Kim successively delivered a 25-kilogram bag of crushed ice ordered by a tofu shop to keep their soybean broth fresh and 125 kilograms of ice requested by a nearby seafood restaurant, but he could hardly smile.
This was because most businesses needing ice, including market merchants, now buy ice directly from factories at lower prices, and cafes use their own ice makers, causing a sharp decline in customers visiting neighborhood ice shops.
The seafood shop that ordered ice on this day was also not a regular client, but rather a case of frantically searching for Kim's ice shop because they urgently needed ice.
"People might think a heatwave means peak season, but that is a thing of the past," Kim said. "Our main client base has dropped by more than 80 percent compared to previous years, and with factories directly supplying market merchants, we have no choice but to fall behind in price competitiveness."
He added, "Until the mid-2010s, working hard for a few months was enough to feed my family, but now even that is difficult. Small-scale ice shops like ours are gradually losing ground."
The worries of ice shop owners are not limited to Kim alone.
While the exact number of stores selling ice in Incheon has not been compiled, around 30 retail ice-selling shops are registered on portal sites.
Ice shop merchants shared a consensus, saying, "Compared to our heyday in the 1990s and 2000s, at least nearly half of the stores seem to have closed down by now."
An owner who has been selling ice in Bupyeong-gu for nearly 30 years said, "Deliveries to movie theaters and various event venues have dropped significantly since COVID-19. Movie theaters used to be major clients ordering large quantities at once, but as audience numbers dropped, our sales declined along with it."
"Sales have dropped by 60 to 70 percent compared to previous years," the owner said. "In the past, cafes also ordered a lot of ice, but now, with fierce competition among cafes, most consume the necessary amount themselves using ice makers."
Another merchant operating an oil and ice shop in Gyeyang-gu sighed on August 4, saying, "With ice sales alone, it's hard to even cover the electricity bill. I just keep doing it because it's what I've always done, but the ice business is already dead."
(Photo: Yonhap News)
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