Samyang's employee-led YouTube channel tops 2 mil. views in 3 months

Samyang Roundsquare, the parent company behind the Buldak spicy instant noodle maker Samyang Foods, said Monday its YouTube channel “samyangman” has surpassed 2 million cumulative views about three months after its launch in August. The channel airs “Fire or Fired,” an original series from BURNT, the company’s spicy food content brand. The show follows Tony, a Samyang employee who struggles with spicy food, as he tries fiery local dishes in New York, Texas, Los Angeles and other parts of the United States. Tony is what Koreans jokingly call a “maepjjiri,” slang for someone with a low tolerance for spicy food. Instead of hiring celebrities or influencers, the company cast its own employee, who interacts with locals on camera. The seven episodes released so far have drawn more than 2.18 million views as of Sunday. The most-watched episode, featuring a visit to Samyang America, the company’s U.S. subsidiary, logged 770,000 views, followed by episodes filmed in Nashville, Tennessee, and New Mexico. Viewers in the United States accounted for about 45 percent of total views, wh