Mukbang sensation and entrepreneur Heebab recently divulged her earnings and the generous compensation she gives her employees.
Hefty paychecks for all: HeeBab, Jwa Hee Jae in real life, appeared during the Sept. 17 episode of KBS2’s “Boss in the Mirror,” revealing that her board members receive a monthly salary of approximately 12 million Korean Won (approximately $9,034) before taxes. Even her entry-level employees receive a substantial starting salary exceeding 5 million won (approximately $3,782). In South Korea, the average median monthly salary is around 3.8 million won (approximately $2,862).
“The board members and I have been together since the early days of the company, so I give them a lot,” she said.
How much she earns: The 27-year-old influencer disclosed that her company’s annual sales exceed 2 billion won (approximately $1.51 million), with product placement as the primary revenue source. She shared that each advertisement fetches a sum akin to the price of a domestic mid-sized car.
Without the ad revenue, her company’s cumulative earnings from 2019 to 2022 totaled 2.4 billion won (approximately $1.81 million). According to Heebab, she earned $9,330 from a single video collaboration with celebrity chef Lee Yeon Bok over the course of a year.
Growing online presence: Heebab gained online popularity because of how fast and how much she eats in her videos since she started as a content creator on AfreecaTV and YouTube in 2019. On YouTube, she has so far amassed a subscriber base of 1.53 million. This year, she has set an ambitious goal of cumulative earnings of 3 billion won (approximately $2.26 million).
Join the conversation+