A large discount store is defined as 'a group of stores with a total sales floor area of 3,000 square meters or more that sells mainly food, home appliances and household goods to consumers without the help of sales staff.' While the Distribution Industry Development Act defines large discount stores fairly clearly, the term SSM does not appear in it.

Scholars define SSMs in different ways. Under the Korean Standard Industrial Classification, SSMs fall under the division 'retail trade,' the group 'general retail,' the class 'general retail mainly of food and beverages,' and the subclass 'supermarkets.' According to the classification, a 'supermarket' is an activity in which a single operator runs a facility of a certain size (165 to 3,000 square meters)

and retails mainly food and beverages along with various household goods, excluding activities run as chain convenience stores.

Lawmakers from both ruling and opposition parties introduced many amendments to the Act on the Promotion of Mutually Beneficial Cooperation between Large Enterprises and SMEs (the 'Win-Win Act') and the Distribution Industry Development Act (the 'Distribution Act') to regulate large stores and SSMs. In April 2010, an amendment reconciled with other bills passed the bill review subcommittee of the Knowledge Economy Committee, but the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade belatedly asked the Legislation and Judiciary Committee to hold off on the Win-Win Act amendment, so the amendments agreed by the parties and the government were not passed. The ministry argued that adding franchise chain stores to business adjustment under the Win-Win Act could breach WTO agreements and cause trade problems. Since regulating large stores and SSMs was meaningful only if both bills passed together, the passage of only the Distribution Act through the committee was controversial. The session ended without either amendment, so no regulation took shape. After the parties agreed to handle the two bills separately, the Distribution Act passed on November 10, 2010 and the Win-Win Act on November 25.

This created rules that restrict the registration of large stores and SSMs and bring franchise SSMs under business adjustment.

Local government heads were allowed to designate traditional commerce preservation zones within 500 meters of the boundary of a traditional market or shopping street.

Stores run directly by companies operating large stores or their affiliates, and stores run as franchise chains, were defined as quasi-large stores and brought under the Distribution Act. The registration system previously applied only to large stores was extended to quasi-large stores, requiring registration with the local government to open in a traditional commerce preservation zone, and local governments may by ordinance restrict or attach conditions to the registration of large and quasi-large stores in such zones.

To add: on November 19, 2015, the Supreme Court sitting en banc held that the opening-hour limits (midnight to 8 a.m.) and two mandatory closing days a month imposed by Seoul's Dongdaemun and Seongdong districts did not exceed or abuse discretion and were lawful (2015Du295). The 500-meter preservation zone the paper describes was widened to 1 kilometer by a 2011 amendment. The government announced rice tariffication in September 2014 and has applied a 513% tariff since January 2015. Studies disagree on how the store rules affected traditional market sales, and as online grocery shopping has grown, some local governments have moved mandatory closing days to weekdays. The paper's sales and import figures are as of the time of writing.