How Ju Rhyu, cofounder and CEO of Hero Cosmetics, got everyone comfortable with wearing pimple patches in public.


How Hero Cosmetics' CEO made once-shameful pimple patches a Gen Z status symbol

Ju Rhyu cofounder and CEO of Hero Cosmetics

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How Ju Rhyu, cofounder and CEO of Hero Cosmetics, got everyone comfortable with wearing pimple patches in public.

The first uh purchase order for the brand was around 10,000 units and we probably sold through the 10,000 units in about 90 days. I know personally when you break out or have acne, there are a lot of negative emotions associated with it. You feel insecure, you are more introverted. You feel like everyone's staring at your face. I'm ju, I'm one of the co founders of Hero Cosmetics. I'm 45 and this is my secret to success. He Cosmetics is a functional skin solutions brand. We are focused on Acne and best known for our Mighty Patch, Hydrochloric Ac Patches. I really love the Hydrochloro but gentle on your skin. I got recruited to work for Samsung in Korea as an ex pat for two years. And then that experience living in Korea for two years is where I used my first hydrolic Acne patch, which eventually became the inspiration for Mighty Patch in Hero Cosmetics. Korea is really known in the beauty industry to be very ahead of the curve in terms of beauty innovation and adoption. So back in 2012, people were already wearing them out in public, the hydrolic Acne patch format was already pretty widely used. So I would go to the office or just walk around and I saw a lot of people wearing them on their faces, asked them what they were for, was told that they were for acne. So I went and I bought some, tried it for myself and was blown away by how well it worked because I put it on at night by morning it got all that gunk out. I knew more people need to know about this product. That was really the aha moment for what is now mighty touch. I was probably 37 or something like that. Uh When we first launched, we actually did not fundraise. So at the time, back in 2017, this was very against the grain. And so I tell people sometimes when you zig, when others are zagging, it can work to your benefit. So back then raising large rounds and raising VC dollars was very uh was very, I guess trendy or it's what a lot of people did. We did not do that. We decided to bootstrap. I have two co founders, all three of us, we put our own money to the business and the philosophy was this business needs to stand on its own 2 ft. This product needs to be cash flow positive and be profitable. So we were very, very efficient with our dollars. The first product was created pretty quickly actually. So I had contacted a lot of Hydro Colo patch manufacturers probably contacted while I was in creative over 10, but only two I think responded to me. And then of those two, the one that we ended up working with, we still work with today. They're obviously a really important partner to our business and worked with them to really develop what is now known as The Mighty Patch. We've made some iterations since then and a lot of brands in beauty and, and personal care will work a lot with their co manufacturer to co create and develop their products. I credit a lot of my corporate experience to I think the success at here at Cosmetics because there were a lot of learnings that I had at places like Kraft Foods and Mondale and American Express that I really still use to this day actually. And one of them is really paying attention to consumer behavior. So, one of the consumer behaviors that I noticed was that the Hydro Colo um patch format where the bandages were actually already around for quite a long time, but they were in the band aid aisle. And if you think about it, uh your breakout can be considered a type of wound. And so there was nothing at that time in the beauty section. And, and really the idea was, can we take this Hydro Colo bandage that sits in the band aid aisle and really make something very specific to acne because I had already seen that people were buying the big bandages and cutting them up into small squares or small shapes and putting them all over their face. And so the behavior was already there where people were buying them in 11 aisle, but using them for a beauty concern. And that was really the insight of, hey, I think we can take this which exists in the band aid aisle, turn it into a beauty product and really market something that's specific for Acne. There were a few other Acne patch players on Amazon at the time, not as many as today, but there were a few. So I saw that people were buying this type of product on Amazon and the demand and the behavior was there. So it made a lot of sense for us to try it out there. It was also easiest, fastest and cheapest because we were bootstrapped. So it didn't take a lot of money or investment or resources to get up and running. Uh You can get up and running probably in a day with the right images and copy. And it was a place for us to, to test and learn to, to validate the thesis that hey, you know, we think people would really be into this type of product and this type of brand. Will it be true? Let's try it on, on Amazon. Uh And it turned out to be very true to this day, we're the number one Acne patch brand in the U SI. Think we have a superior product. We do have a very special formula that actually we own and the product differences, people can tell. So when they use our versus competition, I think they can tell the product difference. I think traveling is a really great place if you wanna be an entrepreneur to get ideas just to observe what other people in different countries are using and doing and, and paying attention to those things because they can be uh inspiration for ideas. It's nice to have smaller ambitions and to um and to exceed them and be thrilled about sort of uh where the business has gone compared to where you thought it might be.