Today we’re interviewing Helen Gi, Founder of HAE Creative, a mission-driven consultant agency that helps a ton of plant-based brands understand South Korea. HAE stands for Human Health Animal Liberation and Environmental Sustainability
We do this in a district in Korea called Itaewon! Itaewon is crazy, it’s this unique, sloping melting pot of so many different cultures and vanity. My friend and I found a bar crawl there and we were surprised how many foreigners showed up.
Helen is such a helpful and giving person who has great insights on the Korean vegan community and has worked in a variety of industries throughout her life. She is eloquent and so community driven and has a lot of heart in what she does and it shows in the interview.
Since Helen collaborates with other food tech players globally, You’ll also get a better understanding on how the Korean market works. It’s a great testbed for innovation.
You’ll also get a good feel on the values and views of entrepreneurship in Korea. I find this topic fascinating as you realize that culture is a big part of being an entrepreneur. In America, we are really gung ho about entrepreneurship. We also have a lot of data, research, talent and drive in America compared to most countries.
What I’ve found most inspiring about South Korea’s food tech community is that it’s carried by some fantastic individuals who really care about the future they create. Perhaps one can say that all great things start with someone who will stop at nothing to make a difference in the world.
What’s Up With Adam
So conference season is over!
You know what that means? You essentially break down and you get sick. A lot of my friends get sick over conferences and it makes sense. Not only are you constantly alert for 3 days but you are also shaking hands with everyone, touching everything, and it’s just super social. Fun fact, I might have gotten COVID in January 2020 because of an international conference.
Anyways, I spent about half a day sick but I’ve trained my body to basically go comatose for like, 12 hours and feel better again. It works for me.
But yea, now I’m finally back doing deskwork and it’s actually really nice. I feel much more productive, I can schedule things, traveling is always nice, but it does throw a wrench into a routine. I ate a lot at the expos and it shows in some of the pics which I’m super self conscious about.
Anyways, I want to talk a little bit about the cool city of Busan. I spent about 7 days at Seoul and 8 days in Busan. It’s the second most important city in Korea and it’s a beautiful, coastal place. My travel buddy had to leave early so I booked at $12 dollar Airbnb (which was just a shack in an apartment building) and just spent my days exploring the beach side city of Busan. I personally loved how close to the ocean it was, but theres also some really pretty landmarks around the area. The little village of Gamecheon culture village, based off of the Little Prince is of note, but in general, it’s just a really relaxing, colorful place to be there.
If you go to Korea and want a breather, Busan is the perfect place to visit. It’s a short 2 hour bullet train ride over and has great seafood.
I hope you enjoy this episode with Helen, we do this in her cooking studio in Itaewon Korea!
Links
HAE Creative
Itaewon
Omnimeat
Green Monday Foods
pulmuone
CJ Foods
Monde Nissin
Big Idea Ventures food competition
Art Museum Leeum Museum
National Museum of Seoul
Helen Gi’s LinkedIn Profile
End of Episode
I’m so happy to be part of the conference circuit again as the last 2 weeks have to do with me going to LA and SF to mix and mingle with friends new and old.
I’m sure you’ve gotten tons of insights about the shows. One more wouldn’t hurt.
The Next Wave – The top brands Impossible and Beyond have grown up and aren’t attending the show anymore. What seemed to grab the spotlight were the new incumbents who have the perfect amount of capital to push forward. Notable alternative meat companies such as meati™ , TiNDLE Foods, and Daring. dominated the scene with a variety of booths, food trucks and samples. The category is slightly maturing into its teenage years as there is now a standard all alt-meat brands must meet. Those that don’t meet that simple level of quality will lose. (actually very similar to audio quality and good podcasts. People don’t need to listen to bad audio anymore)
Ethnic Food- Pockets of ethnic food littered the halls of Expo West. Communities are also being established in the circles. The uniqueness of these companies is their authentic stories which are probably the most valuable thing for young brands to leverage. The stories we can tell as small brands are unique and powerful. No one can take this away from you. Tia Lupita®Foods , FLY BY JING and Xiao Chi Jie (XCJ) were all over the trade shows, sharing the food they grew up with, with the world.
New Technology Wave – Future Food Tech showed the development of a lot of technology that uses fibers and strings to create a unique meat experience. NOVAMEAT and Demolish Foods to name a few. Extremely impressed this technology has been chugging along. Expect this to pick up and surprise everyone in the next 3-5 years.
Funding Issues – No one likes to talk about the current environment but there are a lot of companies struggling to raise capital as there seems to be a slight gloom as I was traversing through the show. Some companies have literally broke. With the pandemic, rising interest rates, and now a chaotic bank run, it’s been a tough couple of years and we will be hearing more of this in the future.
Talent – Old friends from past jobs have new jobs and it’s great to see great talent still in the industry. Being laid off, or let go doesn’t mean you’re out, it means you now have the skill set to empower another company. The best thing about this industry is that we are improving our talent pool immensely and the distribution of talent allows this industry to be stronger.