The image of workwear such as work clothes and uniforms has clearly changed. Work-wear and work shoes branded targeting actual
work sites, such as 'Boldist', 'K2 Safety', 'Ithe Safety', and 'Wilby', are one after another attracting the attention of general consumers
and are being created in work sites filled with hot molten metal and sparks. There is a bespoke work-wear brand that is attracting attention.
This is ‘ARKERD’, a personal protective equipment and work-wear brand created by DaehanSteel (CEO Gyeong-baek Lee), a steel manufacturing company in Busan, and YK Steel (CEO Seung-ho Jang).
PPE, which is used when describing Accord, stands for Personal Protective Equipment and consists of protective clothing, protective equipment (face, head, respiratory system, hands, hearing), body protectors, fall prevention equipment, and safety shoes.
It’s a brand that proposes work-wear in various fields such as uniforms, starting with flame-retardant suits made of ‘ARAMID’ material, which is used in firefighting suits. This brand was not designed to target B2C but it started from the idea of an employee who was wondering how to keep his colleagues safe in a hot workplace. It has a special history in that Team Leader, Sang-mok Park, who worked in DaehanSteel's SCM department for 14 years, submitted it as a new business idea, established a division in 2021, and launched it as a brand in 2022.
It's said that before the birth of ARKERD, employees of DaehanSteel and YK Steel did not consider size or fit while wearing work clothes provided by the company. They thought they were just clothes worn in the field, big or small, but consumables that were discarded once worn or damaged.
As part of ESG management within the company, Team Leader Park thought of work-wear as a way to reduce the rate of use and discard while encouraging a sense of belonging among field workers and promoting safety during work. The idea for work-wear was to increase overall durability, while parts that are prone to wear out or tear quickly can be repaired or replaced.
After the initial product was released, 500 workers in the field tried it on and received feedback to improve the overall usability as well as practicality such as pens, lanterns, and radio receiver holders. Afterwards, employees received work clothes that fit their size and actively used them, which had the effect of increasing their work concentration and sense of belonging to the company.
Awareness of work clothes has also improved by saying that you can wear whatever you want when working, or that safer and better-equipped clothes will be provided as support for safety because you have to wear them when working, regardless of the minimum meaning of work clothes that suppliers think. Depending on the user's work position, patches are added to the basic work clothes that can be used to insert pens, walkie-talkies, lanterns, etc., while work shoes are also divided into 4-inch, 6-inch, and 8-inch sizes depending on the intensity of the work site.
The brand name of ARKERD is a compound word of Ark + Creed (meaning faith). Arc has the ambiguous meaning of ark and electricity and electricity, and like Noah's ark, it expresses arc welding that is often used in actual sites along with the meaning of keeping workers safe. Creed is said to mean respect and belief in workers.
Currently, ARKERD receives orders through B2B as well as employees of DaehanSteel and YK Steel located in Busan and provides products to various suppliers. This year, in order to expand into B2C, we are actively promoting the brand by setting up ‘ARKERD Seoul’, a Seoul office and showroom, in Chungmuro 3-ga, Jung-gu, Seoul, Republic of Korea. The showroom can be visited through a reservation, and is popular with general consumers as it allows them to see the functional fabrics, subsidiary materials, and finished products used in ARKERD as well as detailed details about work-wear.
Meanwhile, DaehanSteel, which launched Accord, is a steel company established in 1954 and is seeking growth opportunities for a second leap by providing solutions that cover not only simple product production but also all services related to rebar. In September 2019, it acquired a stake in YK Steel to strengthen its rebar business capabilities and is creating synergy. It is well-known for adhering to the pricing system and deadline principles and emphasizing a new balance among companies.
The image of workwear such as work clothes and uniforms has clearly changed. Work-wear and work shoes branded targeting actual
work sites, such as 'Boldist', 'K2 Safety', 'Ithe Safety', and 'Wilby', are one after another attracting the attention of general consumers
and are being created in work sites filled with hot molten metal and sparks. There is a bespoke work-wear brand that is attracting attention.
This is ‘ARKERD’, a personal protective equipment and work-wear brand created by DaehanSteel (CEO Gyeong-baek Lee), a steel manufacturing company in Busan, and YK Steel (CEO Seung-ho Jang).
PPE, which is used when describing Accord, stands for Personal Protective Equipment and consists of protective clothing, protective equipment (face, head, respiratory system, hands, hearing), body protectors, fall prevention equipment, and safety shoes.
It’s a brand that proposes work-wear in various fields such as uniforms, starting with flame-retardant suits made of ‘ARAMID’ material, which is used in firefighting suits. This brand was not designed to target B2C but it started from the idea of an employee who was wondering how to keep his colleagues safe in a hot workplace. It has a special history in that Team Leader, Sang-mok Park, who worked in DaehanSteel's SCM department for 14 years, submitted it as a new business idea, established a division in 2021, and launched it as a brand in 2022.
It's said that before the birth of ARKERD, employees of DaehanSteel and YK Steel did not consider size or fit while wearing work clothes provided by the company. They thought they were just clothes worn in the field, big or small, but consumables that were discarded once worn or damaged.
As part of ESG management within the company, Team Leader Park thought of work-wear as a way to reduce the rate of use and discard while encouraging a sense of belonging among field workers and promoting safety during work. The idea for work-wear was to increase overall durability, while parts that are prone to wear out or tear quickly can be repaired or replaced.
After the initial product was released, 500 workers in the field tried it on and received feedback to improve the overall usability as well as practicality such as pens, lanterns, and radio receiver holders. Afterwards, employees received work clothes that fit their size and actively used them, which had the effect of increasing their work concentration and sense of belonging to the company.
Awareness of work clothes has also improved by saying that you can wear whatever you want when working, or that safer and better-equipped clothes will be provided as support for safety because you have to wear them when working, regardless of the minimum meaning of work clothes that suppliers think. Depending on the user's work position, patches are added to the basic work clothes that can be used to insert pens, walkie-talkies, lanterns, etc., while work shoes are also divided into 4-inch, 6-inch, and 8-inch sizes depending on the intensity of the work site.
The brand name of ARKERD is a compound word of Ark + Creed (meaning faith). Arc has the ambiguous meaning of ark and electricity and electricity, and like Noah's ark, it expresses arc welding that is often used in actual sites along with the meaning of keeping workers safe. Creed is said to mean respect and belief in workers.
Currently, ARKERD receives orders through B2B as well as employees of DaehanSteel and YK Steel located in Busan and provides products to various suppliers. This year, in order to expand into B2C, we are actively promoting the brand by setting up ‘ARKERD Seoul’, a Seoul office and showroom, in Chungmuro 3-ga, Jung-gu, Seoul, Republic of Korea. The showroom can be visited through a reservation, and is popular with general consumers as it allows them to see the functional fabrics, subsidiary materials, and finished products used in ARKERD as well as detailed details about work-wear.
Meanwhile, DaehanSteel, which launched Accord, is a steel company established in 1954 and is seeking growth opportunities for a second leap by providing solutions that cover not only simple product production but also all services related to rebar. In September 2019, it acquired a stake in YK Steel to strengthen its rebar business capabilities and is creating synergy. It is well-known for adhering to the pricing system and deadline principles and emphasizing a new balance among companies.