Lotte’s Koala’s March: cookie with hundreds of designs, and the fans on Instagram recording their hunt for the elusive ‘eyebrow koala’ said to bring good luck
- Since debuting in 1984, Koala’s March cookies with a koala design from South Korean maker Lotte have become a hit, with new versions launched annually
- An elusive ‘eyebrow koala’ design said to bring good luck led one fan to buy 100 boxes to look for one and, despite Lotte’s denials, the quest caught on
If you grew up in Asia, you have probably eaten a Koala’s March biscuit. In its original iteration, this crunchy bite-sized snack is filled with chocolate, with each piece featuring a line drawing of a koala.
With their smooth, bevelled edges and excellent biscuit-to-filling ratio – not to mention the surprisingly ergonomic shape that fits snugly between a thumb and forefinger – Koala’s March biscuits are truly a treat.
The snack was created by Lotte, a South Korean food conglomerate founded in Tokyo, which, in 1983, was said to have developed a technique for baking hollow biscuits that could then be injected with chocolate.
The method was used to create the now iconic filled biscuits known as Koala’s March, which debuted in Japan in 1984 to celebrate the arrival of the first koalas from Australia.
Two years later, the biscuits came to Hong Kong. In the United States, where they were released in 1990, the snacks were known as Koala Yummies.
According to Lotte’s Koala’s March minisite – which includes a rather adorable profile page for the brand’s two koala representatives, March and his girlfriend, Waltz – there are more than 600 official designs that can be found on the biscuits, although only 365 are manufactured.
