haruharu wonder

haruharu wonder is a South Korean skincare brand founded in Seoul in 2019 by Jae Won Jeong [5][6]. Its name comes from the Korean phrase haruharu, meaning "day by day," and the brand is built around the idea that small, consistent changes to a daily routine matter more than complicated regimens. Most of its products centre on fermented black rice, an antioxidant-rich extract the company treats as its signature ingredient.

The brand belongs to the broader K-beauty movement and positions itself toward gentle, plant-based formulation. It remains active and is expanding internationally, with a United States retail launch at Target arriving in late 2025.

haruharu wonder was started by Jae Won Jeong, who was born and raised in Seoul and studied art and design before moving into product development. The brand site renders the founder's name in the shorter form "Jae Jeong," while trade publications such as BeautyMatter and the K-beauty retailer Skin Cupid use the fuller "Jae Won Jeong" [5][7]; both refer to the same person, who serves as founder and chief executive. Coverage by Skin Cupid has highlighted the company as a woman-founded K-beauty house.

The founding year is given consistently as 2019 by both BeautyMatter, which specifies April 2019, and Glossy [6].

According to the company, the name reflects an intent to make "little, but effective changes in ordinary routine" — a philosophy it sums up in the line "live with wonder, day by day" [2].

The brand describes itself as a "conscious lifestyle skincare" company with an emphasis on what it calls the sustainable coexistence of beauty and nature [2]. In interviews, Jeong has framed the approach in plain terms, saying skincare "didn't need to be complicated or trend-driven to work" and favouring products that support the skin barrier over time. BeautyMatter characterises the brand's outlook as "gentle innovation" aimed at being both results-driven and approachable [5].

Its products sit in an accessible price tier, generally retailing under roughly 25 US dollars, and reach consumers through a mix of direct-to-consumer sales, Amazon and physical retail partners. The audience spans newcomers to skincare as well as more ingredient-literate buyers.

The core of the range is the Black Rice line, which includes the Black Rice Hyaluronic Toner, the Black Rice Moisture Cleansing Oil, the Black Rice Probiotics Barrier Essence and the Black Rice 5 Ceramide Barrier Moisturizing Cream. Beyond black rice, the brand formulates with ingredients such as bakuchiol — which it markets as a plant-derived alternative to retinol — along with centella, probiotics, maqui berry and honey green tea.

The company's central technical claim concerns its fermentation process. It states that its black rice undergoes a fermentation taking more than 400 hours to complete, paired with a proprietary delivery method it calls Ultra-Deep Technology (U.D.T) [8]. The brand also publishes product-level results such as improvements in skin elasticity and reductions in pore visibility, and presents its formulations as vegan, cruelty-free and fragrance-free. Its listed certifications include The Vegan Society and ECOCERT COSMOS.

The Black Rice Probiotics Barrier Essence has been the brand's standout seller. Glossy reported that during an Amazon Black Friday period the essence sold more than 2,000 units a day, exceeding 7,000 in total, and continued at similar daily volumes after the promotion ended [6].

Sustainability and accessibility feature in the brand's stated commitments. The company says it keeps packaging simple by design to reduce waste, and it adds braille to its outer packaging so that visually impaired consumers can identify products by touch [2].

Much of haruharu wonder's early recognition came through design awards. Its packaging and design work was recognised with the Red Dot Design Award, the International Design Excellence Awards (IDEA), the A' Design Award, the Asia Design Prize and the Ctype Award in 2019, followed by an IF Design Award in 2020. In 2025 the brand was selected for BeautyMatter's FUTURE50 2026 list, which recognised its fermented black rice positioning and "gentle innovation" approach [5].

The brand is active and expanding. It reports reaching more than 150 countries within roughly five years of launch, working with over 90 retail partners worldwide [8]. A recent step was its entry into the US mass market through Target, with eight hero products launching online and in stores in late December 2025 [6].

Figures for the brand's revenue differ between sources. Glossy reported approximately 360 million US dollars in 2025 sales and an internal target near 600 million for 2026 [6], while BeautyMatter cited a projected 50 million to 75 million dollars. The gap is large and may reflect different definitions — for example total retail sell-through versus brand-level revenue — but the discrepancy is unresolved in the available sources.