Latest / Imagine If with Doone Roisin | Health, Wealth & Wisdom for Women (formerly Female Startup Club Podcast) / Omsom is the rowdy Asian pantry brand founded by two Vietnamese-American sisters that sold out in 72 hrs after launch... Here’s how with Vanessa Pham

Transcript

Omsom is the rowdy Asian pantry brand founded by two Vietnamese-American sisters that sold out in 72 hrs after launch... Here’s how with Vanessa Pham · Imagine If with Doone Roisin | Health, Wealth & Wisdom for Women (formerly Female Startup Club Podcast)

0:00
This is Vanessa Pham for Female Startup Club.
0:12
Hey everyone and welcome back. It is Dune, your host and hype girl. Today on the show, we're learning from Vanessa, who is one of the co-founders behind Omsom. We're chatting through how she validated and landed on what their product was actually going to be, what made them sell out in 72 hours launch and multiple times since then, as well as some of her key pieces of advice peppered throughout. If you haven't met Omsom yet, they bring proud, loud Asian flavors into your home
0:41
Vanessa and Kim are first-generation Vietnamese-American sisters who started OMSOM to reclaim the cultural integrity of Asian cuisines that are often diluted in the mainstream grocery aisle. They partner with iconic Asian chefs to craft rip-and-pour starters with all the specialty sauces, seasonings, and aromatics needed for specific Asian dishes. No more diluted dishes, no more cultural compromise.
1:09
And while I've got you here, this is your last chance to enter our $1,000 cash giveaway. And to get in the mix, you just need to go to femalestartupclub.com forward slash 1000 hyphen cash hyphen giveaway. And make sure you refer all the entrepreneurs in your life who would benefit from being part of this giveaway. Let's get into this episode. This is Vanessa for Female Startup Club.
1:37
Vanessa, hi, welcome to the Female Startup Club podcast. Hi, dude, thanks for having me. I'm so excited to be here. Me too. I'm so excited to be here. I know you're in New York. What is your morning like? What have you been up to today? Oh my gosh. Well, it's a Monday morning, so I'm getting into the swing of things. I had my cold brew this morning, had a couple of meetings and yeah, we're just getting ready for the holiday season. So things are like just
2:07
We're all running around like crazy, but it's all good problems to have. Yes, absolutely. Don't you think it's weird that we're thinking about Christmas and like the end of the year? Oh my God. I mean, it's so funny because like we are direct to consumer right now. And so, you know, we have to get things ready a couple of months ahead. But when we're looking at like the retail environment, that's like planning for the holiday, like
2:35
a year before. Like it's just a totally different timeline. So I'm learning all the different timelines in the CPG space. It's all new to me. So we're figuring it out. It's all new to me too. I'm going to need to like come back to you at a later date for those timelines and how it works. Yes, I got you. I always love to start by getting you to give us a little bit of an introduction on you, who you are, what your business is, the kind of elevator pitch, the quick 101.
3:05
Yeah, absolutely. So hello, everybody. I'm Vanessa Pham. I am the CEO and co-founder of AumSong. AumSong is a proud, loud Asian food brand that exists to reclaim Asian flavors because they've been diluted in the grocery store for so long. My sister and I started it a little over two years ago, and we're the daughters of Vietnamese refugees. And my background specifically has been as an e-commerce and CPG strategist.
3:32
So before starting OnSum, I was a management consultant at Bain advising Fortune 500 CPGs on retail strategy and growth strategy. And then before that, I actually ran an e-commerce business while I was a student at Harvard, grew that like 40% in a year, had a ton of fun with that.
3:48
And so that's really where my background is. But starting Aumstam two and a half years ago, it was a huge leap because I was 24. So I had like very little experience, but, but, you know, really wanted to build something that could inform cultural dialogues and conversations at the national level. So
4:07
At Amsum, our North Star is creating products with cultural integrity, doing right by the Asian American community. And so that's like the whole goal of our company. But yeah, basically what we do is we craft starters. That's what these are. They're basically pantry shortcuts that allow you to make Asian dishes in 20, 30 minutes, restaurant quality on your table. We have your back on flavor and you can kind of
4:30
flexes to your dietary preferences and restrictions. But really the vision is to build the new authority in Asian food products. So yeah, it's been an incredible first year in market. We had a partnership with Disney. We've had these beautiful full features in the New York Times, Fast Company, Forbes, Food & Wine, Epicurious, Vogue.
4:52
And yeah, and now we're growing the team. All this stuff is happening. And we're just so grateful to have kind of like the platform and the ride or die community that we've built. Oh, my gosh. Wow. Wow, wow, wow. So many things to unpack here. For anyone who is listening in on audio, Vanessa was just showing us her incredible experience.
5:11
uh starter packs on the video if you're going to check it out on youtube or go and check it out on her actual website because the branding is so worth a look and i absolutely love it
5:22
I have like so many questions and like the overarching question is like, how did you get all those amazing things in your first year in business? But I don't want to get ahead of myself. So let's kind of go back to when you were starting to think about launching this business and what you were thinking about when you were, you were obviously working at Bain, but at some point you start thinking, Hey, I'm going to essentially leave my job. Right. And build this brand. Yeah.
5:49
You know, I was around 24 when I decided to start AMSAM with my sister Kim. And it really came on a personal level from a place of feeling like there, when I looked out at the world, there were not enough business thought leaders that had a perspective like mine. So, you know, a Southeast Asian woman, a Vietnamese woman.
6:09
And I knew that was my personal goal was to be a thought leader in business and shape those national dialogues. But I felt like when I was a management consultant, kind of on that corporate path, that it would be such a struggle to get there, that it could take, you know, it could take years and years. And who knows, maybe by the time I actually got to that place, I might be a different person. I might have conformed to the values of those institutions.
6:34
And I wasn't willing to risk that. So that was on a personal level why I was finally ready to take the risk, even though my whole life I had been so risk averse. And then professionally, what I was really looking for was, you know, to change the dialogue around Asian food. There was all this talk about Asian food being cheap or Asian food being, you know, dirty or unhealthy or oily or salty.
6:58
And we wanted to kind of reclaim those conversations and put a product out that actually reflected Asian cultures in a way that was honorable and respectful and really made those communities proud. So, you know, I really wanted to to impact culture in that way. And so those were the kinds of the motivations that finally had me like, you know what, if I want to do it, I'm going to do it now on my own terms. And with the perfect co-founder that I could the most perfect co-founder I could have asked for was my sister.
7:25
Was Kim always like wanting to build a business with you or did you have to do some convincing to bring her on board? Kim has always actually been a risk lover. So she's always wanted to start a business. I didn't know she wanted to start one with me. So when I finally kind of got ready, we actually were on a trip in Bolivia traveling and hiking the salt flats. And I kind of brought it up to her and she was like, I've been waiting for this day. So I had no idea, but she was so ready to start a company with me.
7:56
Oh my gosh, I love that. That's so cool. What a nice trip. What a nice moment to have that with your sister as kind of like a starting point. How did you get started? What were those early steps? I guess we're talking like 2019 at this point when you're kind of like starting to explore suppliers, manufacturing, how it's going to look financially. What are those early days like for you?
8:23
Oh my gosh, the early days were really challenging. Really, really challenging, both professionally and personally. But they got us where we are. And, you know, I'm really glad I went through it. I felt like it was a really important time for us as founders. But yeah, I mean, I would say the big things on one hand, it was like knowing how to get started. Like we had never started food businesses before. You know, we didn't know what the right steps were, who to talk to. So it was figuring everything out from the ground up.
8:52
so grateful for all the people that gave us time to be able to like speak to these things and let us ask questions. So I learned a ton, but, but yeah, I felt like it was a lot of just learning everything for the first time, leaning on people, making mistakes, wasting time going down rabbit holes and realizing, oh wait, that's not actually something that we need to work through. And then at the same time,
9:17
There was all the personal stuff that I had to work through as well of like, oh my gosh, all the uncertainty that I felt like not knowing what I was doing. Like my whole life, I had all these kinds of brands and institutions that I derived a lot of my self-worth and sense of safety from, like, you know, having that net. And we were the daughters of Vietnamese refugees without generational wealth, also working through a lot of money scarcity. So there were all these elements of uncertainty, not knowing what I was doing, but ultimately was able to find our way.
9:47
through being resourceful, asking the right questions, and getting the right people on board, whether, you know, as mentors or just as supporters in general to help us figure out what's the next path, what's the next or next step in the process or path.
10:02
When you say, you know, there was a lot of early mistakes and like going down rabbit holes and being like, oh, this isn't the direction. Are you able to paint a picture of what some of those looked like, especially for people who like me are in the food or the beverage industry and who are wanting to avoid pitfalls if they can learn from someone like you who's been through it? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think the biggest thing is like what I've learned is that being like,
10:30
part of what makes a founder like good at what they do is not having all the answers at all, but rather being able to solve problems and get the right people bought in early on. So, you know, in many, in many senses, that's selling, but it's about asking the right questions and getting the right people along for the journey. And so, yeah, I think going back to the beginning, I would have been less concerned about knowing the answers. I feel like I got tripped up all the time. It's like, Oh my God, I don't know what I'm doing. I don't,
10:59
I've never done this before. And it's almost like that's irrelevant. Like, you know, it's nice to have that, of course. But if you don't, that's not actually an issue. I would have been much more focused on like, who do I need to talk to? And like, how do I get the right people in my ecosystem in the mix of the AMSAM universe to get to the next step and really be focused on the next step?
11:21
Pay less attention to like, oh my gosh, what's the like the three year plan? Because, you know, there's so much you need to solve. And if you can be laser focused on what's next, what's next, it's like, it'll give you a lot of, you know, ability to focus in on the right things and be able to solve the right problems.
11:36
Yeah, I love that. That's so interesting. And I'm thinking like when you were in those really early days of R&D, like, you know, in your first kind of six months, who were the kind of people you needed to surround yourself with? Like what kind of literally like people, roles, skill set did you need around you? Yeah, absolutely. So
12:00
I mean, I would say some of the biggest ones are obviously founders that are just like a year or two ahead of you, right? Like those are going to be the most helpful people because their knowledge is so relevant to your experience and your questions. And they just did it. And in this day and age, dynamics are changing constantly. So you need people with like recent perspectives. And I would really speak a lot to those people. Operators. Yes, investors can be helpful. But in my experience, operators are actually the most helpful.
12:29
And then another perspective I would always try to like really have top of mind early on is just consumers that are in your target demographic. So we did a lot of research early on, surveying people, interviewing people, literally watching people cook in their kitchens who were, you know, frequent consumers of Asian food products. And that was really helpful in shaping and informing our perspective and our product.
12:56
That's so cool to watch people cooking. Were they cooking with your product or they were cooking dishes that they already knew how to cook and you were watching from that and then developing from that? Both. We did a whole mix of things, just like learning how people consume Asian food today. Like, how do they get it on their table? Like, what are the steps to that? What are the challenges? What are they looking for? What are the values that they're aligned with? Like on all dimensions, like what are their criteria? But really the biggest thing was like, what is the hardest part?
13:26
Um, so we did different types of research at different points in our journey. And how long did you do like that piece for? And when did you feel like comfortable thinking, yeah, like we're validated, we have the feedback that we need, like we can move towards launching now. Um, so we were in that research phase for like a couple of months, like probably at least three months. Um.
13:50
But partially because we just didn't know what we were going to do. And so it was like, we had a mission in mind. Like we knew our mission was to reclaim Asian flavors and build products with cultural integrity. We didn't know what the product would be. And so it took us a couple of months to, to get to the right product, which is now how we landed on the starter. But in terms of like having the conviction and like knowing this was the right path. Oh my God. I don't even know if I ever really felt it. So we were literally producing it. Like it, it,
14:17
I didn't have, I mean, we had a strong perspective, but like conviction is like a whole other piece. Like I didn't feel like conviction is almost as much as it is about mindset as it is about like actual research and knowledge. You know what I mean? And so it's been a long journey for me building conviction. Like even when, you know, things have gone really well, our first year really, really well, but like there are always still moments of doubt and self-doubt.
14:44
Yeah, absolutely. And that inner voice that sometimes just creeps on in and you're like, please leave. This is eating me alive. Yes. I always love to ask about the early stage of capital, you know, how you were financing the brand in the beginning, what kind of money you needed to get started and what your like general approach and thinking towards money was when you were getting started.
15:12
Yeah, absolutely. I think this is a really important conversation because every business looks so different from the consumer's perspective and behind the scenes. And there's reasons for that usually, and it usually has to do with financing. So, you know, for us, we bootstrapped as long as we could. We were 24 and we didn't have generational wealth. And so it was really hard. So I was living in New York without a salary for a year. I was doing odd, random things to try to pay my rent.
15:39
And it was super challenging. It was one of the hardest parts about starting the company. And I felt it every single day. We actually went out and raised our pre-feed because I ran out of money. And we were paying for everything out of my sister's bank account. She was 26. So it's not like she had a lot of money. So we bootstrapped for a year. And then we kind of hit a point where it's like, well, we got to raise if we want to keep doing this. So at that point, we went out to raise a pre-seed.
16:07
And it was a really challenging raise because raising early stage for food businesses is really tough. There's not a lot of capital at the really early stage, unless you personally know investors.
16:20
And so we basically went through a process where we got a bunch of no's and we're talking to all the wrong people before we got in front of the right people. And this was because my sister worked in VC, so we naturally tapped her network, but she worked in B2B SaaS. So like these investors were like software investors. So they were like, wait, you're talking about physical product that expires, like has shelf life? Like what? No, that's, you know, that's nothing we want to throw our money behind.
16:47
And so we talked to all the wrong people before finally, you know, one person was like, wait, actually, I might have a friend who might be interested in this space. And then one thing led to another. And then we started talking to the right people. And then that's when we got momentum. But yeah, absolutely. Like, I just wish people normalized, like, the process of talking to the wrong people and it being a numbers game, because, like, it was for us.
17:18
We had a high level of ambition and we wanted to be able to launch in a way that we felt the Asian American community deserved. Meaning we wanted to like have the clearestness, have the right people supporting us, you know, get the press, like have the beautiful brand. We wanted all of that.
17:34
And so that's why kind of we raised our pre-seed. And also because in order to do that, the backend that a food business demands to be able to fulfill that type of vision is like, you need to have a co-manufacturer. You need to have a third-party logistics provider. And those are expensive to get started with because with a co-man or co-manufacturer, you need to hit their minimum order quantities, right? And so you have to get all the raw materials, all the packaging and stuff. And those are pretty expensive. So
18:01
That was the rationale behind the pre-seed. And then basically a couple months after we launched, we had seen some really strong traction. And so at that point, we decided to go out and raise our seed round as well. And that was a lot easier because we had real data to present to investors. And my logic with raising in general, I think there are a couple of things that have made us a little bit different.
18:27
One is that we've never wanted to build a business that's reliant on investors. And so we're very thoughtful about how we deploy our capital. We've been quite efficient to date with all of our spend. And that's really because we want to be in the driver's seat. We want to make decisions that allow us to do right by our community, because we know that a lot of investors...
18:50
we want to make sure that we're bringing the right ones on board. So we want to be able to pick and choose. And so you need to have like a really strong value prop to investors if you want to be able to pick and choose. Because at the end of the day, we want to work with investors that understand brand building, understand investments that we're making in service of long-term value creation, not just like short-term pops on top line sales. And so it takes...
19:15
it takes a certain type of investor to see that journey and want to be on board for that journey. And so we vet investors a lot in the process.
19:24
Yeah, that's my question to you is like, how do you actually know who is like that and who is not like that? Because obviously we've heard, you know, so many stories around people getting the wrong kinds of investors and people who aren't aligned in their vision. How do you actually get to that? Is it just like a really direct conversation around like what you will and will not be doing? Or is there more due diligence or something around it? Yeah, so a lot of it is what you described. And I think what is like,
19:54
Why there's tension in that is not because people don't necessarily know their vision, don't know how to explain it. It's because in the process of fundraising, if you're in scarcity, you're going to sell relentlessly and actually not sell what you're trying to achieve.
20:11
you're going to say a lot more of what you think the investor wants to hear. And so I think it's a lot of actually internal work as a founder or with your co-founder around being super clear of what you're trying to build, what you will and won't do to your point, and having the conviction to tell that to the investor when you can tell they're going to say no because of it and being comfortable with that and being like, actually, that's what I want. I don't want to waste anybody's time. And even more importantly, I don't want to bring the wrong investor on board.
20:40
It's kind of like, I don't know if this resonates, but it's like when you're at a certain age, when you're dating, when you're younger, maybe in your 20s, you don't know who you are yet. You're like trying to say what you think the other person wants to hear. And they're like, oh, like, you know, I love watching sports all day. And that's what I'm looking for. And you're like, oh, my God, damn, I love sports. I'm like, actually, I fucking hate watching sports. Right. So it's a little bit of that. It's the same thing where you finally get to the point where you're like, no, I know who I am.
21:06
And I'm okay if I present myself authentically and people self-select because of it. You want to weed out the people that you don't want to be around. Exactly. And so, you know, what that looks like in the fundraising process is when you're pitching them, you're showing them, you know, your five-year plan. And they're like, oh, like I got, we got a lot of this, like,
21:28
oh, you're looking at, you know, being moving towards profitability pretty early. Is that even what you want? Like, wouldn't you want to grow more aggressively and spend a lot more? And that's when I, you know, had a real honest conversation where I'm like, I hear you. And like, if this was five years ago, we might've taken more of that approach. But I think we've seen enough physical products, DTC businesses pan out where they didn't pay enough attention to profitability early on and ended up not being able to solve that down the road.
21:57
So like if we want a sustaining business, like we're going to pay attention to that early on. We're not going to make that our number one priority, but it will be on the list of KPIs that we're at least paying attention to and want to ensure that we have a path towards that. So like having those hard conversations is really critical with investors.
22:15
Yeah. And I imagine actually, you probably want to make sure you're having hard conversations so you can make sure because undoubtedly there's going to be hard conversations throughout the journey. So you need to get familiar with what those hard conversations are like early on to be able to know whether you're going to be able to have them in like a healthy kind of way in the future, if that makes sense. A hundred percent. Yeah. Yeah.
22:41
Love that. In the timeline of when you did the pre-seed raise, how long before your launch was that? And how long did you think you needed to give yourself in a pre-launch where you were actively like building community, starting to kind of put the word out there pre-pressing go on like sales? Yeah, that's a great question. Honestly, I'm trying to remember. I don't remember the exact length of time. All I know is that was a lot longer than we thought. I want to say like
23:11
five six months or something and maybe it ended up or we thought it'd be like five months i feel like it crept up to like eight months or something like that i don't know remember exactly but it was also tough we launched during covet so we had a ton of delays related to covet and supply chain but it took us a while and yeah yeah maybe it was like yeah five we thought it was gonna be five months maybe it was like eight months it took us a while
23:35
Because we had to figure out a lot of stuff. Everything takes longer than you think. And a lot of it is out of your control, especially with mostly with physical goods. You can't just like spin stuff out of nowhere. Like we totally underestimated how long it would take to, you know, get the certain approvals, like scheduled processes, which are like approvals of formulations.
23:58
That took a long time. Getting the right visual identity took forever. We threw away like multiple fully baked visual identities before we like felt comfortable with it.
24:08
We just had a really high bar. And I think it was the right thing. I mean, you don't want things to be perfect. But when you're a consumer-facing brand, I think there are... If you're software, I think it's very different because you can constantly iterate and stuff like that. But for us and our strategy, it totally depends on your strategy. But for our strategy, we wanted to come out strong and really speak to people's hearts and really resonate and cut through the noise early on. That was our goal and our strategy with our launch.
24:35
With that in mind, and you don't need to be specific about yours, but you can be if you want to, but what do you think would be a good ballpark marketing budget for a launch? So keeping in mind things like making sure you have 10 out of 10 content to launch with, 10 out of 10 PR representation, you know, gifting influences, like if you're doing the whole kind of
24:59
shebang. What do you think is a good marketing budget for launch if you've gone through potentially pre-seed or if you have access to capital through like debt, et cetera? For sure. Oh my gosh. That's a really good question. I think it's just so dependent on your goals and who you're trying to speak to and what market you're going after. For example, like if you're launching a plant-based meet,
25:24
Like your budget's got to be really large to cut through the noise because that space is so busy. And you're competing with so many brands. But if you, back when we were launching, now I think our space is getting a lot hotter. But like there weren't many, you know, like D to C Asian food brands. There were very, very few. And so we were much leaner. And so our budget was in probably like the low tens of thousands.
25:51
So I would say it really depends versus I know some of those other brands, like, you know, the PR firms are working with are like easily 15K retainers a month, for example, or they're working with branding agencies that charge like upwards of $200,000, which like we were not looking at that. Like everything we did was on the much leaner side. We tried to do everything the leanest way possible. And so we were able to keep ours in like the low, just like a couple tens of thousands.
26:17
But, you know, it also depends on how much expertise you have in house. Like because we were so adamant that we were going to be a critical part of driving everything, including brand strategy. We were able to work with like kind of lower spend on the support that we had for that. For so people who would kind of take it like the last, you know.
26:40
the last bit versus them fully owning the full stack of like brand strategy and everything like that. So it really depends on how much capability of that do you have in house and how much do you want to be driving that? And because we wanted to drive a lot of that, we were able to spend a lot less on it. Got it.
26:56
I read that you sold out in 72 hours. So I'd love to know like what you attribute that success to and what your launch, like what went really well in your launch that was able to drive that kind of, you know, crazy results. And was there anything that didn't go so well that you would say, just scrap that, you know, didn't need to do it? Yeah. Oh my gosh. So I would attribute that.
27:23
the kind of traction that we saw super early and then kind of, you know, since then we've sold out seven more times, which has been wild, but. Oh my God, that's amazing. Yeah. I mean, obviously, you know, that's on the supply chain side, we've been like, ah, trying to figure that out. And we have been able to scale that up in due time. But I would say the biggest thing I would attribute that to is.
27:45
Our ability to cut through the noise as a brand, which we're very grateful for, which goes back to us really knowing who we are, what we're here to do and who we're speaking to. Being super clear on that has allowed us to speak consistently differently.
28:02
to the right people, like the right audience, and from a place of really genuine care around our mission and values that people can feel. And what that's allowed us to do then is to build a community and then at the same time have, you know, media outlets understand, you know, oh, wow, like, look at that real resonance that brand is having. I want to speak about that.
28:24
You know, what they don't see is like, oh, look at those founders who saw a white space in the market and are capitalizing on an opportunity. Like what they're seeing is soul and heart and real care about a mission. And so they want to write about that. And so right out of the gate, we got a ton of national press that kind of allowed Amson to break through and really speak to people and resonate with them emotionally. I love that. That's amazing. Oh, so cool.
28:53
What's working for you now when it comes to marketing, when it comes to both, you know, organic and paid and all the things, what's kind of your focus when you're allocating budget? Yeah. So, you know, to date, our growth has been largely organic, like 90% organic. So we spent very little on paid and, you know, that's something we would, in general, we would like to build out more of a performance marketing engine.
29:21
But intentionally, that was not a focus of ours in our first year. We really, like I said, we want to build a brand that stands the test of time. And so we're constantly thinking about in the first year, how do you lay the groundwork for a brand in service of long-term value creation? And so, yeah, we really focused on investing in...
29:44
Content. So my sister and my co-founder, she's really the heart and soul of AumSum in many ways. She is the one developing, you know, a lot of our content. And we take a really thoughtful and editorial approach to content. That's a huge investment of ours, just in terms of like her bandwidth and time.
30:04
And which, you know, as a co-founder, that's a huge investment. And then beyond that, we're investing in building community like those are the biggest things. And then at the same time, we're like starting to test and learn on the performance side of things. But really, for the first year, we've been super focused on organic marketing through community brand building and content.
30:25
When you say you've been focused on, you know, building the brand and specifically the community, what does that actually mean? Like, how are you actually building the community? Yeah, so a lot of it is just being unapologetically ourselves on the various platforms that we exist on. So, for example, on Instagram.com.
30:48
You know, our team dedicates a lot of time to creating original content to educate around the multitudes within Asian America, to create a space for dialogues that are potentially controversial or potentially, you know, hot takes. Let's, you know, let's call them that. We, and those are, the reason that those are really big investments is because one, we have to do a ton of research and diligence around putting those perspectives out in the world. We don't want to be misinformed.
31:16
And then also we put so much emotional labor into them because our community holds us to such a high standard. Like we really want to make sure that we're actually doing right by them. So it's like doing the research. It's getting six people's perspectives across the team.
31:33
getting their eyes on it, having, you know, behind the scenes, having dialogues and debates on like, is this aligned with who we are? Is this really the perspective we want to put out? Whereas most brands would never even try. They're just like, okay, let's put another UGC up. Let's just put another product photo up. And like, that's our next post. Some of these posts takes us hours or like weeks of research to get to. And so, yeah, that's kind of like some of a peek into what that process looks like for us.
32:01
Yeah. And I really feel that, especially in some of the videos I was watching on your TikTok that are quite like informative and educational and super interesting. And yeah, I was like, wow, this is this is pretty intense. Like, this is cool.
32:18
Yeah, yeah, those are great. That's a great example of a place where and you know, what goes into that is a lot of research across the team. And of course, like a lot of, and then of course, after the fact posting it, right, that's really where the community is built, like, in the comment section, in the resharing, in the dialogues that spawn from that creation of content. And of course, we want to be engaged in that phase, too. So there's a lot of work that goes into the
32:43
responding to DMs and comments, the questions that we get, criticism that we get, which, you know, we're grateful for our community engaging in that way. But yeah, a lot of work goes into that too.
32:55
Wow, that's amazing. I know we're getting close to time, but I quickly wanted to ask you about your relationship with celebrity chefs like Pepper Teagan. I know you created with her, you've created with a whole bunch of amazing men and women in the industry. And I wanted to know, how do you actually attract that kind of partnership? And what does it look like on a financial, like on the financial side of things? So what I mean is that,
33:23
do you pay like them upfront or are you giving them a royalty on items sold kind of thing? Yeah. So, so funny. When we first started building AumSum, like from day one of like knowing what the price was, we knew that we had to get
33:42
these chefs on board because, you know, even though I'm technically Asian, I'm Vietnamese and I can't purport to be, you know, the expert on Thai food and Japanese food and Korean food. So from day one, we were like, we want to get the right people involved in our journey and shaping the product actively from start to finish. So that's why we brought on our tastemakers.
34:04
But when we first started trying to talk to them and getting them onboarded, it was so hard. I mean, we were literally like nobody. We were like, you know, in our mid-20s, we didn't have clout in the industry. And so it was really hard. And these chefs had so many competing focuses. So, you know, it was like literally us DMing them, cold emailing them, walking up to their restaurants and being like, do you have five minutes to talk to us? And us pitching them, just like we did investors.
34:31
But then as time has gone on, it has totally evolved and it has gotten a lot easier because now we're out in the world and we have a real community, which we're super thankful for. So that's been wonderful to see that kind of evolution for AMSOM and we're super lucky for that.
34:49
In terms of how it's structured, from day one, we have also been adamant about compensating equitably. And what that means is not just giving them a project, you know, a project-based chunk at the beginning, but actually giving them a royalty of sales into the future. And that's really important for us because we want them to feel bought in and we think they're a huge part of our success. And so that's been, you know, how we arranged it with all of our chef partners.
35:19
That is really, really cool. I love also that there's so there's so many. There's such a variety of different people who are like now coming tastemakers, as you call them, becoming part of your community on that level as well. So interesting. Love it. We're so grateful.
35:37
Yeah, gosh, I bet. For the non-alcoholic wine brand, my business partner is a master sommelier, and it's just been such an eye-opener to work with people who are top of their field, experts in what they do, and they're able to bring this whole different energy, vibe, language, like everything to the table that...
36:00
You know, you could build these brands individually, sure. But having someone who truly is able to kind of like bring the essence of what they do, I think it's just like a really, it's just like a really cool way to go about it, I think. So I really loved watching what you guys were doing.
36:19
Yeah, I so agree. And I think, you know, what's so funny is like a lot of founders or a lot of, a lot of the industry talk has been like, okay, well, like if you bring on somebody, make sure they're like, kind of like savvy with like scaling or like they understand what it takes to manufacture. And I actually disagree with that because that in that challenge of like the places where like, we're hitting a wall where like,
36:47
something that they want isn't possible in manufacturing because they, you know, they produce meals in, you know, on a like kind of one, one off basis on a restaurant counter, so different than manufacturing. But that's really where the creativity and the differentiation happens is when they really challenge you. They're like, look, this is a non-negotiable for me. I
37:10
And, you know, if you didn't have them, they're pushing back, you might not be forced to be like, all right, let us go back to the drawing board one more time. Let us find a new food scientist who's going to help us solve this problem. Let us go, you know, source a new ingredient to meet those objectives. Like it made the process longer, but it really is where the magic happens.
37:29
Yeah, it makes your product 10 times better. And it also really adds that moat around the product and what you're doing because it's something truly unique. Yeah, I totally get it. That's amazing. Love that. At the end of every episode, I ask a series of six quick questions. But before we get started on those, my final other question is, what is your go-to advice for entrepreneurs
37:59
In the CPG industry specific? You know, I think one of the biggest things is being...
38:14
Coming from a place of abundance as much as you can is really important, even on the tactical side of building the business. Yes, it's important in terms of like, you know, your personal experience of it. But I think some of the best decisions have been made when I'm coming from a place of abundance. So how I do that is actually imagining in those places where I'm starting to feel like, oh my God, this is a really hard decision. What do I do?
38:41
is coming from a place of, okay, imagine put myself in those shoes of me five years from now, having achieved absolutely everything that I wanted with the brand, you know, whether that be, you know, got it acquired by this dream strategic or built a community this large, or like, you know, invent, raised this much. And then, you know, whatever it might've been, my goals, say I achieved all of them. If I was that person, how would I have made the decision that I have in front of me now? And like actually feeling and channeling that type of
39:11
of conviction and then making the decision. And it becomes a lot clearer. And it really allows you to tap into something that sometimes isn't available in the early stages, which is having that true conviction and abundance. So yeah, that's how I do it. And I really encourage people to recenter in the toughest decisions around that type of access to that type of abundance.
39:37
That is such good advice. I really appreciate that. Thank you so much. I haven't heard that before. That's amazing. I love it. Okay, we have three minutes. We've got six quick questions. Let's try and see if we can do it. I don't want to take up too much of your time. Question number one, what's your why? Why are you doing what you're doing?
40:00
my why at the end of the day is always like to do right by the Asian American community. Like we work in service of them. That's our North star in everything that we do. Uh, we want to make them proud and, um, yeah. Love it. Question number two is what has been the number one marketing moment that made the business pop?
40:21
I don't know. I maybe I mean, one that I can think of early on in our journey. What? Oh, actually, probably one really cool one was being on the CNN homepage with a product review that had the headline. Like this is one of the best kitchen products we've ever used.
40:39
Wow. That's amazing. Oh my God. It was really cool. Question number three, where do you hang out to get smarter? What are you reading or listening to or subscribing to that other founders would benefit from knowing about? I would say in general, it is really who I surround myself with. So like,
41:02
Having regular conversations, if you can, with people you deeply admire. So that means early on getting them really excited and bought into what you're building and you as an individual, and then trying to see if you can have regular meetings with them. That's really where I found the most value because it's really tailored to your experience. Yeah, I love that. Network is so important. Question number four is how do you win the day? What are your AM or PM rituals and habits that keep you feeling successful,
41:33
happy and motivated? Okay. I'm not, I haven't been great about this. So I'm glad I'm saying this out loud to be accountable, but absolutely journaling is huge for me. Like I am somebody that needs to process things like, you know, not just in my head, but putting pen to paper is like a game changer for me.
41:52
Yeah, I really wish I was a journaler. I just do not know. Like I've tried so many times, but I just do not know what to write when I put a pen on the paper. I'm like, oh, don't know. This is going to be embarrassing. I'm not going to write it. I really want to give it another go. Yes, it takes like honestly two weeks to get to a good place on it. Like at first it's really awkward, but if you just try to write three pages a day for like at least two weeks, you'll get a lot better at it. Oh, that's a great piece of tactical advice.
42:20
Go to advice. Thank you. Question number five. If you were given a thousand dollars of no strings attached grant money, where would you spend it in the business? Okay, I would spend it on. Probably, I mean, there's a lot of things that have probably content creation. That's been the most important thing for us.
42:50
Yeah, definitely. Amazing. And question number six, last question. How do you deal with failure? What is your mindset and approach when things don't go to plan? First is just like I first surrender to the feels by myself. I think there's no, you know, nothing wrong with, you know, feeling, experiencing sadness or grief or disappointment, you know, and like not trying to, not letting it fester, but actually diving into it and letting it.
43:20
you know, fit with you. And then I share it. I really think vulnerability is the path to healing.
43:25
and and moving forward and getting clarity and so being vulnerable with your team with your co-founder your support system and saying like oh really bummed and like this is where i think we went wrong uh but then moving forward and learning is obviously like the next phase of that but i think you can't just skip to the learning and i think so many founders are like all right like you know what maybe some people can but that's not my style i actually have to feel things and so i'm invested i'm really invested emotionally and so
43:52
I like to make sure that I'm going through steps one and two before trying to learn. Yeah, I love that. It's important to to sit with it and and also ponder, like think about it. Just let your thoughts go with it and see see where that also takes you, which I guess leads to the learning. Totally. This is so cool. I am.
44:15
just think you are so awesome. And I love the brand. I think everything you guys are doing is really, really special. So thank you so much for taking the time to come on the show and share all of your learnings in that short amount of time. I've loved this. Thank you. Thanks so much, June. I really enjoyed this.
44:39
Hey, it's June here. Thanks for listening to this amazing episode of the Female Startup Club podcast. If you're a fan of the show and want even more of the good stuff, I'd recommend checking out femalestartupclub.com where you can subscribe to our free newsletter. We send it out weekly covering female founder business news, insights and learnings in D2C, and interesting business resources.
45:04
And if you're a founder building an e-commerce brand, you can join our private network of entrepreneurs called Hype Club at femalestartupclub.com forward slash Hype Club. We have guests from the show joining us for intimate Ask Me Anythings, expert workshops, and a group of totally amazing, like-minded women building the future of D2C brands.
45:26
As always, please do subscribe, rate and review the show and post your favorite episodes to Instagram stories. I am beyond grateful when you do that.
45:42
Hey, it's June here. Thanks for listening to this amazing episode of the Female Startup Club podcast. If you're a fan of the show and want even more of the good stuff, I'd recommend checking out femalestartupclub.com where you can subscribe to our free newsletter. We send it out weekly covering female founder business news, insights and learnings in D2C, and interesting business resources.
46:07
And if you're a founder building an e-commerce brand, you can join our private network of entrepreneurs called Hype Club at femalestartupclub.com forward slash Hype Club. We have guests from the show joining us for intimate Ask Me Anythings, expert workshops, and a group of totally amazing, like-minded women building the future of D2C brands.
46:29
As always, please do subscribe, rate and review the show and post your favorite episodes to Instagram stories. I am beyond grateful when you do that.