For ten days in October, the small town of Geumsan — South Korea's ginseng heartland in South Chungcheong Province — becomes the centre of the ginseng world. The 2026 International Ginseng Trade Fair runs from 2 to 11 October at the plaza of the Geumsan World Ginseng Expo, and this year one of the headline exhibitors is Geumsan Insamju, a liquor maker whose craft is officially recognised as national heritage.
What makes this producer worth knowing about? Its ginseng liquor technique holds two significant designations: it is registered as Korea's Food Master No. 2 and as Intangible Cultural Heritage No. 19. In plain terms, the person leading the brewing is a state-certified master of a tradition that has been passed down for generations — and at the fair, that master will run live demonstrations of the whole production process, not just stand behind a table of bottles.
The liquor itself is worth understanding, too. Geumsan Insamju makes yakju (a medicinal rice wine) and distilled spirits using domestic rice and ginseng. The key difference from the ginseng-infused bottles you might have seen elsewhere: ginseng goes in from the fermentation stage, built on rice and nuruk (a traditional fermentation starter), and the spirit is then vacuum distilled. Rather than flavouring a finished liquor, ginseng is part of the brewing from the start.
The company is also trying to drag ginseng liquor out of the souvenir-shop shadows. It now produces bottles at a range of alcohol strengths, uses contemporary packaging, and is courting younger drinkers with a more refined image. Export is the next chapter — Geumsan Insamju is already working on foreign-language promotional videos and market-entry consulting, with the United States as its first big target and other regions to follow.
For visitors at the fair, the programme is hands-on: the Food Master-led brewing demonstration, tastings of the core yakju and distilled ranges, and exhibitions of the products. Buyers from home and abroad will be working the floor too, so the atmosphere blends trade show with festival.
Why should a traveller care? Because this is a rare chance to taste a genuinely protected craft tradition in the place it comes from, rather than at an airport duty-free. Geumsan itself is a fun detour if you're travelling through central South Korea — ginseng is everywhere, from markets to food, and the Expo plaza gives the whole thing a focal point. If you can't make the fair dates, keep an eye out for the brand as it pushes into international markets; a heritage-designated ginseng spirit with modern packaging would be an easy addition to a Korean restaurant or bottle shop near you. Either way, the story is a good reminder that Korea's drinking culture goes well past soju — there's a whole world of rice wines and distilled specialties built on centuries of technique.
