When it comes to beekeeping, the adage “no pain, no gain” is often embodied literally in the stings that beekeepers endure to produce their delicious honey.

For Hanul Honey CEO Joonha Yoon, this adage has an even deeper connection to his career. During the Global Financial Crisis in 2008, he resigned from his corporate job in Seoul amid the economic hardships, returning to his hometown of Yeongju to figure out his next steps. While spending time away from the fast-paced city life, he discovered his passion for honey, one of his hometown’s specialties.

This led to the establishment of Hanul Honey. At first, the company was focused entirely on wholesale business, until he was presented an opportunity to expand business by working with Coupang in a small business support project run by the Gyeongbuk Economic Promotion Agency. Through this project, Joonha entered the Coupang Marketplace, expanding his business to work with five independent beekeepers. Joonha continued to focus on his business, growing steadily until 2020, when the pandemic hit.

“Originally, I hadn’t even thought about the retail business, but I started it on Coupang with Gyeongbuk Economic Promotion Agency’s support project. Then suddenly, COVID-19 arrived,” said Joonha. As it was for everyone, adjusting to the pandemic at first was extremely painful. But from that pain came yet another opportunity.

With the pandemic, “The online market opened up,” said Joonha. “Now, our retail sales are even better than sales from our wholesale business. Overall sales went up thanks to Coupang, and we even built a new factory.”

Hanul Honey, which recorded monthly sales of less than KRW 100,000 (around 75 dollars) when it first joined Coupang Marketplace, has now grown to average over KRW 10 million (around 7,500 dollars) in monthly sales.

This year, Hanul Honey joined Rocket Growth, which is further expanding its business. Rocket Growth is a service for merchants that allows small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) to leverage Rocket Delivery’s logistics infrastructure to sell nationwide to customers with the same speed and convenience of Coupang’s own delivery services.

“Using Rocket Growth is convenient because Coupang manages our logistics and responds to customers,” said Joonha. “Now, I can focus on improving product quality and making the most of my strengths. Also, we don’t have a large warehouse, which space a big constraint when we were stocking honey, but with Rocket Growth, Coupang handles the storage, so I’m satisfied with the efficient use of space.”

Another benefit of Rocket Growth is that sellers have the freedom to choose the quantity of their items to produce and store with Coupang, with even free storage provided for the first two months of joining. Thanks to the soaring sales, Joonha says of his experience, “Now I feel like I’m on a rocket.”

Joonha’s dream is to eventually run a smart farm apiary, collecting sweeter honey with less harm to the local residents. To achieve this, Joonha needs to be able to scale at a much larger volume, and Rocket Growth provides the wings to support his dreams.

“At Coupang, everything we do revolves around our customers, which includes working together with great SMEs with high-quality products like Hanul Honey to provide the best selection to customers,” said a Coupang representative. “We will continue working to create jaw-dropping experiences for customers and small business owners alike.”