Sulseam

How It Began

Sulseam's official founding year is 2013. Its history lists the founding of Guksaem in August 2012 as the first entry, before that, and records the conversion to a corporate business in May 2013. In 2015 it moved its headquarters to Yongin, and in 2022 it set up corporations in Mungyeong and Yeongwol.

CEO Shin In-geon graduated in mechanical engineering from Kyung Hee University and completed a course at the Korea Home-Brewed Liquor Research Institute. The vision the brewery puts forward is “liquor that brings new joy (新), a spring you can trust (信).” Its welcome message says it makes its own nuruk based on the wisdom of classical texts and puts care and fundamentals ahead of speed and mass production.

Sales grew more than tenfold, from about ₩500 million in 2013 to ₩5.3 billion in 2023. In a 2021 interview, Shin said he wanted to set up regional specialty liquor companies around the country and brew liquor from each region's specialty products. At the time, six employees handled brewing, and he also described a plan to put each of them in charge of a brewery somewhere in the country.

How the Liquor Is Made

Sulseam brews with rice grown locally under contract. The yakju Gamsa is made from Yongin-grown Baegok rice, bedrock water, and nuruk the brewery treads itself. It is fermented and aged at low temperature without enzyme or yeast preparations. It is an unpasteurized fresh yakju.

The distilled soju Mir is made by aging a liquor brewed only from Baegok rice, water and house-made nuruk for six months, then distilling it at atmospheric pressure in a copper still. The makgeolli I'm Free is a gluten-free takju brewed from rice alone, without wheat nuruk or enzymes. Its listed ingredients are purified water, rice, guk (koji) and yeast, at 9% ABV in a 500ml bottle.

Under the Liquor Tax Act, a liquor with less than 1% traditional nuruk is cheongju, and one with 1% or more is yakju. In a 2021 interview, Shin explained that by this standard Gamsa is a yakju and Seoseol is a cheongju. Seoseol is brewed with rice nuruk instead of wheat nuruk. The method for making yellow-koji (hwangguk) rice nuruk was obtained through a technology transfer from the Rural Development Administration.

Signature Liquors and Lineage

The first new product in its history is the traditional ihwaju Baekseol Gongju (Snow White), in October 2013. It released the distilled soju Mir 40 in March 2014 and the yakju Gamsa in April 2015. In June 2016, Mir 25 and Mir 54 were added, completing the Mir series.

In May 2016 the brewery received a red-koji (hongguk) technology transfer from the Gyeonggi Agricultural Research and Extension Services. The same month it released red makgeolli brewed with red koji, Suljwihan Wonsungi (Drunken Monkey) and Bulgeun Wonsungi (Red Monkey). The name Mir means dragon (龍), referring to Yongin.

In March 2020 it released the gluten-free takju I'm Free. It is characterized by a rich, banana-like sweetness and fruity aroma, with no nuruk odor. In May 2021 it was followed by I'm Free 6.0 Omija.

Recognition

In October 2012, two months after Guksaem was founded, it won the grand prize at the 1st Royal Court Liquor Brewing Contest. The yakju Gamsa won an excellence award in the yakju and cheongju category of the 2017 Korean Liquor Competition. It was then selected as the toast liquor for the 2018 dinner for heads of overseas missions.

Mir 40 received the Presidential Award at the Korean Liquor Competition in November 2018. Before that, in 2017, the brewery was selected as a Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs “Visiting Brewery.” The experience course “Brewing the Seasons,” announced in 2023, was run under a support program for “traditional liquor education and training institutions” designated by the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs.