Romi Haan was a housewife in South Korea with a problem: how to keep the floors clean without spending hours a day doing it. Because of the ondol tradition of heating homes through the floor, Koreans spend a great deal of time at home in a central room, on the floor. As Romi says, "Koreans live on the floor. We sleep on the floor. We eat on the floor. We sit on the floor. We play on the floor."
Keeping the floor clean is serious business for Korean women, and means daily washings, down on their hands and knees. Romi wanted to free herself of this daily chore, or make it a little easier for herself and her friends. So, she imagined a steam cleaner to do just that: clean the floor with less effort and cut the time spent on washing the floor in half. It was a way to get women up off the floor and out into the world.
When Romi approached a bank about a government loan program to get her product made, the bank officer asked her, "What company did your husband bankrupt that makes you now have to work? Are you doing this for him?"
When she told him that her husband was not the reason she wanted to go into business, he didn't believe her. Her application was denied. Romi didn't take no for an answer, and persisted with her dream. She mortgaged her home and quit her job to pursue her invention. She was able to get her business up and running in three years, but faced other hurdles.
When Romi tried to market and distribute her product, she was met with skepticism and disdain by male buyers for department stores. She would go in to talk to them, and they would ask her, "Why do you need a steam cleaner when you have a vacuum cleaner?"
She explained that a vacuum cleaner would sweep the floor, but her cleaner would mop it. After an hour-long discussion the buyer would ask again, "Why do you need a steam cleaner when you have a vacuum cleaner?"
Ten years later, Romi Haan is now the CEO of a multinational, multimillion dollar appliance and beauty products company, Haan Corporation. She is one of the few female CEOs in South Korea, and her business is thriving. She represents a new breed of Korean women executives and a model of successful entrepreneurship. Her story is not atypical of the challenges that women face in the global economy, but her success is unfortunately too rare.
I was privileged to hear Romi's story firsthand at the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Women & the Economy Summit in San Francisco recently. The conference brought together women leaders, government officials, diplomats, and corporate innovators to discuss actions to improve the lives of women in the Asia-Pacific region, and by doing so, the world's economy. Recognizing that women are a vast, largely untapped resource for change and growth, the group spent a week in San Francisco working on plans for change. This was one of several meetings around the Pacific Rim leading up to the APEC Summit in Hawaii in November, which President Obama will attend.
The Conference Keynote was delivered by US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, a woman who has inspired a generation of women to enter political life to try to dismantle the political barriers that keep women from fully participating in economic growth. Secretary Clinton's speech was a call to action, for all nations to tap the power, creativity, and drive of women to help elevate all people, across all regions.
and are proud owners of several of Jean-Michel's video series on PBS. We wanted Alex to hear what he had to say, since care of the ocean will largely be left to the next generation. 
