Today we’d like to introduce you to Kevin Chon. They and their team shared their story with us below:
Kevin and Jin are siblings, and their parents had their own business in the apparel industry in Los Angeles. Their parents were manufacturers and used to sell to large retailers and when their designs were being stolen and also costs were causing them to dumb down products, Kevin and Jin knew that they didn’t want to go through the same experience and that meant THEY had to own the brand.
Coop started with a sewn-shut pillow, and the feedback from customers was always that the pillow was too high or too low. Hearing that feedback Kevin and Jin decided to open up the pillow and see if they could allow the customer to optimize. To their surprise, they realized the reason these pillows were sewn-shut, the shredded memory foam fill was actually remnant fill. These were leftovers from various mattress production runs, the scraps were collected off the floor and shredded up, and put in these pillows. This was not acceptable to Jin & Kevin so they pushed the manufacturers to make prime memory foam – after two years of searching and pushing and being told by the industry that this was crazy they were able to make the pillow that would pass the “mom” test. Our mom has a lung condition, and if we didn’t feel confident that our mom could safely sleep on the pillow, then it wouldn’t be good enough for our customers either.
We’ve never stopped listening to our customers and our products are constantly evolving to meet those needs. To say we are pillow nerds is an understatement. We care so much about the quality of our products and our DTC model gives us the freedom to really create what we believe is the best product.
Sleep is imperative to our health and we are so happy to be able to help so many people achieve better sleep.
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
It’s been a long, fun, bumpy road – being siblings has been helpful to our journey in that there is an immense amount of trust, but also the freedom to be VERY VERY candid, but also a history of family relationship – so it took probably seven years of working together to get to a great place. There were lots of fights, struggles, frustration, laughs and our parents advising us.
We’ve been sued, we’ve been bamboozled, we’ve traveled the world together and there are moments where we thought our business would fail. That’s the natural course for any business.
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about Coop Sleep Goods?
We were the first to offer adjustable pillows in the market. We applied our apparel experience to an industry that was sleeping and fine with a one size fits all solution – but that didn’t make sense to us. We are all unique and sleep differently so why would we use the same pillow?
We are so proud to have leveraged Amazon as a platform, to create a brand. In apparel, unless you know the right people and have the right look, your brand never stands a chance of launching. With Amazon and DTC, we were able to WIN and create a brand with amazing products, which really is the way it should be.
What matters most to you? Why?
Product quality, customer feedback – integrity and authenticity. If you have a good product, you don’t have to “market”.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.coopsleepgoods.com
- Instagram: @coopsleepgoods
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/coopsleepgoods/
