we are Jelly Key
Once upon a sandy shore, we witnessed the marvel of little boys building castles fit for royalty. They spent hours delicately placing snail shells on each and every door, gate, and wall. Yet, with one swift wave, their hard work was swept away into the sea. But like magic, the next day, the beach was again littered with sandcastles, each one more impressive than the last.
Inspired by the tenacity of these young builders, our team in the audio industry decided to channel that same energy into creating a product that would withstand the test of time. With years of experience, we knew we had more to offer than what we thought, but it was the fear of failure that held us back.
But with a newfound motivation, we overcame countless challenges, from finding the right Accessories and Supplies to tackling material issues and receiving negative feedback on our earliest demos. We refused to let setbacks derail us, and instead, we channeled our inner sandcastle builder to create something truly remarkable.
The end result is our Premium Sound System, a work of art that’s as sturdy as a castle and as magical as a fairytale. We poured every ounce of our expertise into crafting each component with precision and care, ensuring that it would stand the test of time.
Just like those sandcastles on the beach, we may face the occasional wave of obstacles, but we’ll never let them destroy our determination to create something truly extraordinary.
product quality
Joiha’s top priorities are selecting high-standard items, ensuring that no toxic chemicals harmful to human beings are used, and making sure their products are durable.
fine art design
Product optimization is not solely about appearance but also convenience and effectiveness for the customer, which should be packaged in a simple design. Each keycap at Jelly Key is crafted with meticulous attention to detail, patience, and an aesthetic touch by our artists. In addition, when you receive a Jelly Key product, you can expect an awe-inspiring visual experience.
research & development
Joiha invests 30% of our expenditure into researching new, high-quality, and eco-friendly products. At Jelly Key, creativity never sleeps, and we continuously strive to create new and unique keycaps to ensure our customers’ satisfaction. Since our inception, we have created 103 keycap series, with 67 sold out. Our team goes through extensive research and brainstorming to generate ideas, which we then carefully craft, polish, and deliver to you. Inspiration is everywhere, and we love transforming it into something that perfectly fits your fingers.
In today’s world, technology has become an integral part of our lives. With the advent of smartphones, tablets, wireless internet, and other high-tech devices, people are almost always connected online. However, this constant connectivity can lead to a lack of concentration, which can negatively impact our creativity.
To combat this, using DIY (do-it-yourself) and handmade products can be a way to escape from the digital world and reconnect with reality. These products are crafted with significant attention by skilled artisans and help to maintain our innate human creativity.
In a world where mass-produced products are ubiquitous, more and more people desire something unique with a human touch. This is why handmade gifts have become so popular. Who wouldn’t want to hold something truly special between their fingers and marvel at its beauty?
Most customers are discerning and want innovation but may be hesitant when it comes to significant changes. However, even minor improvements can make a big difference for them. Nonetheless, exclusive changes are crucial for a product to stand out.
Join us on a journey to a fantastic world that exists right in front of you every day, on your mechanical keyboards.
Everything is going to be better
Joiha team is always heading towards a future of better things. We want to bring fine products that people will love and care for.
2010 – 2013
2010/2012 – 7xu was established. To sell affordable audio equipment, 7xu was born with headphone brands of Sennheiser, Denon, Beyerdynamic, Audio Technica; and music players of Sansa Cowon, Iriver, Samsung, Colorfly.
7/2012 – Experimenting with headphone wires. The team first started working on different wire materials for devices like Headamp, Dac, etc. then moving on to headset wire. Reconstructing headphone cables will change the sound quality, depending on the type of headset and wire material to produce different types of amazing sound.
9/2012 – Starting a business of modifying wire. Services of remaking earphones, silver & OCC copper wires for headphones, and making wires for amplifiers, headamp were provided.
10/2012 – Experimenting with custom headphones (CIEM). This is a type of headset that can only fit one person. It has good sound insulation, better fitting, and can be inserted in more drivers.
1/2013 – More widely experimenting of reshell services. Start testing with customers who want to change their regular headphones (those with amateur drivers) into custom headphones by measuring and molding the ears, then reworking the headphones.
4/2013 – Beginning the project of headphones made in Vietnam. At this point, 7xu.vn started having prototypes, considering their design and completion to apply knowledge and experience into the initial versions. Everything was very difficult with full of challenging questions, each of which the team had to solve on their own.
8/2013 – A completed headset was born. After many experimental samples, an acceptable version was finally released. During this period, the team took the material and design into careful consideration to eliminate unnecessary components and measure the sound quality.
19/2013 – Closing 7xu. We were a team of 3 young people who were still unfamiliar with starting a business, but never regret the time pursuing our own passion, filled with so much enthusiasm that the table lamps where we used to work were never turned off. But everyone had to grow up, everything had to be better. We decided to close down 7xu and take one more step closer to the dream of the whole team, which is Joinhandmade.
12/2013 – Joinhandmade’s headphones. When the team sat down and decided to launch the product, we realized a huge shortcoming. We created a product that just merely went along with the market; more than that, we made something that we didn’t want. We had to consider competitive selling price, following up with the design of other headphones, aiming for profit… So in the end, we decided to leave all that behind, and created Joinhandmade, focusing on handcrafted products, making the headphones we really need, creating something that we can actually own, rather than just sell it. The team believed that every product would have its own audience, and they would definitely love it.
2014
2/2014 – Jelly Ear. Finally, the team’s headset was born and named Jelly Ear. The demo version was sent to members of our community to experience.
3/2014 – Support from the media. When the Techinasia newspaper published an article about the team, everything became clearer, we started harder to focus on perfecting Jelly Ear, from importing materials to supporting equipment, packaging, etc. After that, we sent out test samples and received more feedback. Many newspapers such as Genk, Zing, VnExpress, and Dantri posted positive articles about the team.
7/2014 – Launching the first headphones made in Vietnam – Jelly Ear. In May, there were pre-orders available on the team’s Facebook page, and we had more than 200 orders from users nationwide. In early July, the product began to be widely sold on the website and retail distributors.
2015
3/2015 – New Jelly Galaxy version released on Indiegogo. This time we added completed microphones and reduced half the price. As a result, after 3 days, we received order values of over $6k even without a single marketing campaign and it’s only $35 per order.
6/2015 – A colorful headset project. Besides luxury, what we also wanted to aim at was originality, where young people can learn to cherish their personality and love themselves first before showing it.
As we believe that if an object has emotion, it should be based on the desire to satisfy the reason why it exists in the first place. For example, the purpose of a water cup is to contain water inside. If it has emotions, it will be happy to be filled with water and will be sad without water inside. A computer monitor’s core value is communicating with people. The core value of a unicycle is to be performed in the circus. For toys, their purpose is for children to play, and so there would be a primitive fear of being thrown away or becoming an outcast because of new toys. As for headphones, their happiest thing is to be always in the bag, ready to be used proudly, conveying their values: smooth, beautiful, unique. Simply a headset that its owner loves and keeps.
9/2015 – In partnership with Miss DJ Vietnam. We were very pleased to co-sponsor Miss DJ 2015 in Vietnam. Music and youthfulness were what we aimed to bring.
11/2015 – Jelly Doux was born. We desired to create a colorful, customizable headset product with a unique and stylish microphone, and most importantly an affordable price for students. After 3 months of researching and experimenting with the prototypes, Jelly Doux was created and pre-ordered on Indiegogo.
2016
1/2016 – Delivery of Jelly Doux headphones. Completing customers’ pre-orders, Joinhandmade began to deliver them, receive feedback, and make replacements for customers if they’re not satisfied. We focused on analyzing and solving product defects to make them more perfect for later sales.
2/2016 – Jelly Key was born. Jelly Key is a very special segment that we have created for the first time: buttons (keycaps) for mechanical keyboards.
With experiences in pure hand-crafting and working in small-sized machining environments, a Joinhandmade artisan leader was allocated to be in charge of Jelly Key with hopes to bring great keycaps to our new customers. With a mission to ensure product quality, Joinhandmade started applying stricter quality control processes keycaps to be finished. Jelly Key was able to create an amazing quality control team.
5/2016 – Jelly Clan was born. To support the Joinhandmade production’s image and website, the design team had made a lot of efforts with high-end equipment costs. Since May 2016, the design and photography team of the company has been separated into an independent team – Jelly Clan, supporting Joinhandmade teams such as Jelly Audio, Jelly Key, and even external customers, startups, and businesses with high-quality design and photography needs.
6/2016 – The first keyset was born. Inspired by a magnificent artwork by one of the most famous painters of all time – Starry Night keyset was created after 2 weeks of non-stop developing and designing. The dominantly triangle-shaped icons of the keyset are a unique feature as in terms of high tech or design, they evoke strength, movement, and the future.
7/2016 – Joinhandmade became Joiha. The name Joinhandmade was especially meaningful to us and held many beautiful memories. In the beginning, Joinhandmade’s founding members thought of a name that was closely associated with handcrafting, and they were so successful in building a company that has such unique values like it does today.
However, the name Joinhandmade needed to be developed in a way that it’s clearer, easier to call, to write, and simply carrying the spirit of its own creators. Joiha was born, holding 3 product lines inside: Jelly Audio (Joinhandmade before), Jelly Key, Jelly Clan.
9/2016 – T-ara. For the first time ever, a member of the T-ara group used Joiha’s Jelly Galaxy headphones on stage in Busan (Korea). This was hands down a great honor to us.
10/2016 – A story about profit or quality. This was the question we’d been asking at the very beginning. Eventually, we decided to allow ourselves to design and produce sensational keycaps that the mechanical community hasn’t seen before.
There were two notable cases about the trade-off between profit and quality: The First Frontier (spacebar) and Like/Unlike (1u keycap). We produced around 500 spacebars to get 205 finest spacebars to deliver to MassDrop customers, and around 90 Like/Unlike keycaps to deliver 19 of them. We wanted to make sure that every single customer gets the keycap that was worth the time and money they spent.
12/2016 – “Best Artisan Keycap” in 2016. Held by Deskthority, Jelly Key proudly won the award of “Best Artisan Keycap” which showed recognization and support of mechanical keyboard communities from around the world. We were delighted to be the winner and therefore motivated to continue designing keycaps that could help broaden our creativity in the form of handcrafted products.
This month also marked one of our charity activities, in which we donated all the money from the “Pink/Grey Vicious Orc keycap & Tiny Little Monster keycap” raffle to Unbound – a trusted NGO sponsoring children and families who live in poverty.
2017
01/2017 – Another raffle for charity to kick off the Lunar New Year. We raised $1329 for Unbound from the ‘Oasis Keycap raffle‘. This acted as a New Year gift from the mechanical keyboard community and Jelly Key.
This was also the time when we can take a moment and review the past year of 2016. It was a challenging yet fascinating year for us to learn from the basics to launch our first products, to overcome difficulties in design, production, customer services, website development, shipping, and many more.
02/2017 – Jelly Key is Jelly Key. During this time, there had been a rumor spreading throughout the redditsphere, that we are “just a money-making scam” and have “no appreciation for the community”. This rumor was hurting what we’re standing for so we had to clarify that we are not a scam, nor K3KC, and have no relation in any form whatsoever with K3KC.
We stand for artisanal keyboard products that go through a creative process exclusive made by the Jelly Key team. We strive every day to innovate, improve, and create innovative artisan concepts for keycaps that can inspire the community.
03/2017 – One year of learning. Up to this point, we have learned so much about creating a piece of art on a small area of a keycap. So we wanted to try something new and focus on artisan mechanical keyboard case, wrist rest, scrupled keycap. We’re determined to show more brilliant designs and our ability to manage the material inside the keycap.
March 2017 was also Jelly Key’s first birthday! To celebrate us turning 1, we had organized a series of activities from March 13 to March 18, 2017, which included giveaways, raffles for charity, bidding, and releasing new and cool stuff. We’re thankful for a great team of legacy artists to idea booming newcomer innovators that always put their heart and soul into their work.
04/2017 – Our first close-down. During these months of 2017, our team had faced many critical issues. After countless heavy debates, we had to announce that Jelly Key would be shutting down the studio.
05/2017 – Jelly Key birthday card & how we made it. Our birthday card was especially in calligraphy handwriting. We stand for handcrafted product, so we think it is essential to write our dear customers a birthday wish with pen and ink. Every birthday card was a unique one, individually customized with their names on it.
07/2017 – Dealing with more challenges. This time they were late shipment, defective keycap, and issue with miscommunication of customer support. We needed to pay more attention to the operation of the Jelly Key as a team. We made mistakes and learned from them by staying and keeping Jelly Key alive to gain back the trust of our fans.
2018
01/2018 – A surprise gift for Jelly Key’s friends. We’re having many new crazy ideas this year and keeping on a good track with designing and crafting. While working on Jelly Key’s 2018 plan, we had an overview discussion of the past year and how we’re deeply grateful for our customers’ precious support. So we sent a valuable surprise gift to our five lucky fans – a business class ticket on our spaceship, and the destination is Mars!
03/2018 – Jelly Key 2nd Birthday Party. We took a look back at our past mistakes and what we did to resolve the problems. Human resources, late shipment, QC failures, or misunderstanding due to language barrier. These would not get us down as we’re committed to taking responsibility for our mistakes. We also kept improving our work every day and renewing our designs with fresh ideas to make custom keycaps that could break through the boundaries between imagination and reality.
07/2018 – Desires of Jelly Key makers: Michael Nguyen & Stephen Ngo. Our designer, Michael Nguyen, the spirit of creativity with all the brilliant ideas of Jelly Key keycap designs; and Stephen Ngo, our clever artist that has a good grasp of knowing materials and components. They’ve been working together since the day Jelly Key was first established until now. This amazing duo took part in making Jelly Key the unique pioneer in crafting keycap with amazing inner sculptures, the mystic universe, constellations, or natural sight.
08/2018 – Jelly Key new website system ‘soft’ direction. We launched a new website system direction with 3 important updates that could enhance our customer experience. They were order status, support center, and speed & security of the new website.
11/2018 – Another website update. We added Sucuri Pro in the middle of our website and Cloudflare for better DDoS Prevention & security for visitors & users.
11/2018 – Jelly Key team charity trip. We took a visit to a local town located in a highland province in Vietnam to support the villagers with food and other necessities. The whole trip was a beautiful memory where our Jelly Key team had the chance to gather and do what’s good for our community.