The History of H Mart

In the late 1970s, Il Yeon Kwon left South Korea and moved to New York. The son of a farmer, he opened a grocery store in Woodside, Queens. He chose the name Han Ah Reum, which roughly translates to "one arm full of groceries" and also carries a warm, affectionate connotation. That venture grew into H Mart, which now has more than 100 locations across the United States. In the 1980s and 1990s, Kwon and his then-wife, Elizabeth, opened several more East Coast stores before expanding to other parts of the country beginning in the 2000s. Elizabeth reportedly championed the clean, modern layout of H Mart stores as a way of combatting the negative stereotype of Asian grocery stores being grimy or run-down. H Mart specializes in Korean food but also carries products from Indonesia, Japan, China, and more. Today, H Mart is run by Kwon along with Elizabeth and their two children and is known for providing Asian families with easy access to the flavors of their home countries. It is also known for introducing new populations to Asian foods and helping to popularize many of them in the U.S., such as kimchi and gochujang.