Empowering Women with Holistic Care: A Conversation with Rael's Co-Founder and CEO, Yanghee Paik

Summary

Rael co-founder and CEO Yanghee Paik described how she left Disney to build a women’s-care company around a gap she and her co-founders saw in the U.S. market: limited access to high-quality, clean feminine-care products. The company used Korean manufacturing and product technology, began with organic cotton pads, and has expanded its positioning toward holistic care across the menstrual cycle.

Strategy and execution

• Find an underserved customer need. Paik and her co-founders saw that U.S. feminine care was dominated by established brands, while consumers were increasingly seeking organic and “clean” products in other categories. Their experience as Korean immigrants also gave them a comparison point: they considered Korean feminine-care products more advanced and convenient.
• Use e-commerce to validate the product before expanding distribution. Rael launched on Amazon, where customers were already searching for organic options. The company treated reviews as product-development input, analyzing customer feedback and iterating its pad product; Paik said the current version was the seventh edition.
• Build proof before approaching major retailers. Strong Amazon reviews and sales helped establish credibility with retail buyers. Rael later entered Target, then expanded to other major retailers. In preparation for physical retail, it adapted its packaging—making it more colorful and shelf-visible—based on Target’s feedback.
• Use Korean capabilities as a business advantage. Rael sources products from Korean manufacturing partners and applies Korean technology to the U.S. market. Paik said her Korean background helped the company navigate those partnerships and spot trends in both Korea and the U.S.
• Expand from a hero product into a broader brand. Rael moved from pads into intimate-care products and then skincare, including acne patches, masks, cleansers, serums, and creams. Its stated ambition is to serve women’s needs throughout the cycle, rather than be seen only as a pad or tampon company.
• Pair education with entertainment in marketing. After prioritizing Instagram, the company shifted more attention to TikTok over the prior two to three years. Its content combines educational explanations of cycle-related care, humor, product demonstrations, influencer collaborations, and behind-the-scenes material featuring the team.
• Tell the brand story through experiences. Rael took eight TikTok influencers to Korea in May to introduce its founders’ heritage, Korean manufacturing partners, and K-beauty experiences. The goal was to make the company’s Korean roots part of its story organically, while retaining its identity as an American brand.
• Respond to local market conditions. Rael entered Korea after a public controversy about ingredients in conventional pads drove consumer interest in organic alternatives. Paik said demand and retailer outreach prompted the company to serve Korean customers directly, using its Korean manufacturing base.
• Recruit around mission and complementary strengths. Paik described the founding team as combining her operations and business experience with co-founders’ journalism, storytelling, and graphic-design capabilities. She said the mission helped attract employees interested in meaningful work; about 90% of the team is female.
• Support access and advocate for the category. Rael works with nonprofits on hygiene-kit donations and education. It also joined a coalition of eight feminine-care brands to raise awareness of tampon taxes and advocate for policy changes.

Metrics, milestones, and targets

• Rael was founded about seven years before the event.
• It became the number-one organic pad on Amazon within six months, according to Paik, and later became the best-selling pad in the overall category.
• Amazon customer feedback informed repeated product improvements; Paik said the pad was on its seventh iteration.
• The company launched at Target in 2019—a milestone Paik recalled as one of its most satisfying early achievements—and subsequently expanded to other large retailers.
• Rael’s TikTok following had grown to nearly 400,000 at the time of the conversation.
• In Korea, Paik said that after media coverage of the ingredients controversy, more than 50% of women began using organic feminine-care products.
• Rael sells through Amazon in Canada and the EU, but Paik said it had not opened offices or run local marketing there. The company was researching Japan and Southeast Asia as potential priority markets.
• Five-year ambition: Become widely known in the U.S. and Korea as a holistic cycle-care brand.
• Five-to-seven-year ambition: Become a more global brand serving women around the world.
• Paik described periods early in the company’s history when cash was down to only a few weeks of runway, creating pressure to raise capital. No revenue, margin, or fundraising totals were provided.

Practical lessons and playbooks

• E-commerce validation loop: Launch on a digital marketplace → gather public customer reviews → identify product gaps → iterate → use performance evidence to approach retail buyers.
• Retail-readiness process: Use online traction to secure buyer attention, listen to retailer feedback, and adapt packaging and positioning to the in-store environment.
• Mission-led marketing: Combine education, relatable humor, influencers, and behind-the-scenes content so customers understand both the product and the people behind it.
• Market expansion: Follow demonstrated demand and local market conditions, but avoid expanding too broadly before the core markets are established.
• Fundraising proof points: Educate investors about an unfamiliar category, demonstrate the market’s scale, and direct them to independent customer reviews as evidence of product quality and demand.
• Entrepreneurial advice: Do the homework, prepare for rejection and uncertainty, stay resilient, and remain open to alternate routes toward a goal. Paik also said that, in hindsight, hiring more experienced consumer-goods professionals earlier could have helped the company and reduced the burden of learning everything from scratch.

Presenters and sources: Yanghee Paik, Rael co-founder and CEO; Selena Lee, moderator. The event was hosted by The Korea Society, with support from Hanwha Life and a partnership with OKTA-NY.