The Invisible Tax. Why I built Korea Deals.
The Information Wall
Living in a foreign country has gotten easier. Translation apps are great, payment systems are becoming global, and maps finally work. But there is one final frontier that technology hasn’t fully solved: Deep Local Information.
If you are a local Korean, you know exactly where to buy a monitor for 30% off. You know which “Hot Deal” community to check for cheap snacks. You know the secret timing for flight ticket promotions.
If you are a foreigner? You go to Amazon or Coupang and pay the full price. You pay the “foreigner tax”—not a literal tax, but the cost of ignorance.
The Problem: Access, not just Language
The problem isn’t just that the sites are in Korean. It’s that the culture of consumption is different.
Korean deal sites are chaotic. They are full of slang, banner ads, and complex verification steps (Active X, Identity Verification). Even if you translate the page, you can’t navigate the context. I’ve seen expats give up on a $200 discount simply because they couldn’t figure out which coupon button to click. That is a failure of design, not of intelligence.
Introducing Korea Deals
That is why I built Korea Deals.
It is not just a translation layer. It is a filter. I take the chaotic, noisy, slang-filled world of Korean hot deals and distill it into a clean, English interface.
1. Real-time Keyword Alerts
You shouldn’t have to refresh a website all day to buy a Nintendo Switch. Locals use bots and scripts. Now, you can too. Set a keyword, and get notified the second a deal goes live.
2. Currency that Makes Sense
“398,000 KRW”. Is that cheap? Is that expensive? For someone thinking in USD or JPY, the mental math adds friction. Korea Deals acts as your currency translator, showing you the price in your home currency so you can instantly judge the value.
3. Search and Categories
Korean forums are often just a chronological list of posts. If you missed it, it’s gone. I organized everything into logical categories. You can search for “Coffee”, “Monitor”, or “Travel” and see historical data. You can see price trends.
Breaking the Wall
Information should be free. Discounts should be for everyone, not just those who speak the local dialect. Korea Deals is my attempt to level the playing field. To remove the “foreigner tax” and let everyone enjoy the same benefits of the extreme commerce competition in Korea.
Check it out here: Korea Deals