Her own words brings global expenses under control with Airwallex AI

Introducing Her own words

Her own words was founded on a clear conviction: women deserve clothing that doesn't compromise on comfort. What began as a Hong Kong-based lingerie brand has since evolved into a full women's lifestyle label: loungewear, activewear, and everyday essentials, all sold globally.

Jennifer Wang

General Manager of Her own words

"Our brand was built on getting every detail right, from fabric to fit. But as we grew internationally, the back-office side of the business wasn’t keeping up. We were spending more time chasing receipts and reconciling expenses than designing products. That’s when we turned to Airwallex."

The challenge

As the brand scaled, so did the complexity of its back-office. Managing trade show travel, hotel bookings, and global ad spend across HKD, USD, and other currencies became a significant operational bottleneck.

Her own words' rapid international expansion exposed three critical gaps in the brand's financial operations.

Issuing and managing cards for business use was painfully slow

As the team grew, so did the need for dedicated spending tools. But sourcing corporate cards through traditional banks was difficult and slow to scale, especially when the team needed to equip dozens of employees across different markets at once.

Overseas and domestic transaction fees quietly eroded margins

Every time an employee used a card at a trade fair, a hotel, or an online ad platform or Shopify billed in a foreign currency, hidden foreign transaction fees ate into the total. Even ad spend billed in HKD through international platforms incurred hidden merchant fees. Across a growing, globally active team, these micro-costs compounded into a significant and largely invisible drag on profitability.

Multi-currency expenses created a reconciliation nightmare

With team expenses incurred in multiple currencies (for example HKD, USD, SGD, and GBP), Her own words faced a tangle of fragmented records. Receipts were collected manually, currency conversions weren’t transparent, and month-end reconciliation took hours. The finance team had no single source of truth for global company spend.

The solution

Airwallex gave Her own words a unified, AI-powered financial platform to manage global spend with precision and speed.

Instant card issuance at scale with Airwallex AI Assistant

Using Airwallex AI Assistant, Her own words has replaced slow, manual card requests with an agile, conversational workflow. The finance team can now issue dedicated Airwallex Corporate Cards for specific departments or employees in seconds. By simply stating the intent, AI Assistant configures the card, sets parameters, and activates it with a single confirmation – allowing the brand to scale its spending tools as fast as it scales its team.

Multi-currency Corporate Cards with zero foreign transaction fees

While each card is issued for a specific role, they all share a powerful underlying feature: native multi-currency settlement. Every Airwallex Corporate Card allows Her own words to spend in local currencies and settle transactions directly from their Airwallex multi-currency accounts, with 0% foreign card transaction fees and no hidden markups. This preserves margins on international spend – whether a card is dedicated to a global ad platform or a local supplier – so growth in new markets doesn’t come with hidden surcharges.

Automated receipt matching and approval with AI-powered Spend

Airwallex’s AI-powered expense has transformed how Her own words manages business travel, global advertising, and day-to-day purchases. AI automatically reads and extracts data from receipts and invoices, regardless of currency, matches them to the right card transactions, and categorises spend into types such as ground transportation, entertainment, meals, and marketing. The built-in Expense Policy Agent checks each claim against company rules, so managers can review, verify, and approve expenses in just a few steps – replacing hours of spreadsheet cross-checking and receipt chasing.

Jennifer Wang

General Manager of Her own words

"For the first time, I feel like our financial tools are as forward-thinking as our products. Airwallex AI doesn’t just save us time, it gives us visibility and control that we simply didn’t have before. Now we can focus on what we do best: building a brand that Hong Kong can be proud of on the world stage."

The results

By adopting Airwallex’s AI-powered spend and card platform, Her own words turned a fragmented, manual expense process into a streamlined, intelligent system – freeing up the finance team’s time and protecting margins as the brand grows internationally.

• AI-powered card management at scale: The team can now issue Corporate Cards instantly through AI Assistant, eliminating weeks of manual processes and equipping every team member for global operations. A single platform now provides a consolidated view of all global company spend, giving leadership the data clarity to make faster, more confident decisions on market expansion.

• Zero foreign transaction fees on global spend: Multi-currency Visa cards removed the hidden surcharge on every overseas transaction, preserving margins as the brand scales its international presence.

• Automated expense reconciliation: Spend reads receipts, matches transactions, and routes approvals automatically, replacing hours of manual data entry and dramatically reducing month-end close times.

Her own words' journey reflects a reality facing every brand that outgrows its home market: the operational complexity of global expansion hits finance teams first. By replacing manual processes with an AI-powered financial platform built on unified infrastructure, the brand has reclaimed time for its core mission – building products customers love.

For businesses scaling internationally, Jennifer has straightforward advice, "The teams that invest in intelligent, integrated financial infrastructure now won't be scrambling to rebuild their stack when the pressure is already on."