How Jun Lee built a $16 million chicken and beer business

Forget Kentucky Fried Chicken, the hottest chook in town is Korean fried chicken.

One of the first places dedicated solely to serving up the spicy, crunchy chicken was Gami Chicken & Beer, a business started by four university friends.

In 1996, Jun Lee, Roi Yoon, Max Ji and Ayden Jung were all Korean students studying at Monash University in Melbourne when they made a deal to start a business together in 10 years.

"I came here as an international student and I barely spoke English," Lee says.

"I was struggling to settle in and made some friends and we were all studying business or IT. Every Friday night was our Korean dining night. Like any uni students, we were worried about our future, talking about what will you do after graduation and we thought it would be nice to do something together in 10 years."

Two of the friends ended up working in hospitality, while the other two worked in marketing and sales.

"A few years later, we sat down again and we were sharing what we did and I said, 'Do you remember when we said we'd do something together?'," Lee says.

"Since two of us were chefs, we thought, 'Somehow we can create value together'." Read more