Karlee Ozener
Karlee Ozener (née Zhang) is a Chinese-heritage entrepreneur and the co-founder of Hello Klean, a London-based personal care brand whose shower filtration products address the root cause of hair and skin damage caused by hard water. Her founding of Hello Klean was rooted in direct personal experience: while travelling for work in the beauty and luxury industry — including at Tiffany & Co. in New York and Huda Beauty in Dubai — she identified hard water as the cause of the persistent hair and skin problems she was experiencing, and set out to create a solution that addressed the water itself rather than masking the symptoms.
Her background spans the fashion, beauty, and luxury sectors, with experience at globally recognised brands across the United States and the Middle East. Living and working in Dubai in particular exposed her to some of the world's hardest water, deepening her understanding of how mineral-rich tap water strips skin and hair of moisture and disrupts natural barriers. That lived experience became the product insight at the core of Hello Klean: filter the water at the source, and beauty products work as they should.
She co-founded Hello Klean in 2019 alongside her husband Omer Ozener, funding the company's early development from £75,000 in personal savings and building it without external equity until it had reached over one million products sold. More than 70% of revenue comes from subscriptions, and monthly customer retention sits above 97% — a product quality metric that reflects genuine consumer outcomes rather than marketing spend. The brand gained mass-market recognition when it appeared on BBC Dragons' Den and secured investment from Steven Bartlett, triggering a 700% surge in demand.
In November 2025, Hello Klean secured a £1.5 million debt facility from Berlin-based re:cap to fund international expansion into the Middle East and further European markets, while remaining entirely founder-owned. As the brand's creative and product director, Ozener continues to lead Hello Klean's product development and expansion into the shower-care category it helped create.
