About this episode
Kim and Vanessa Pham are the founders of Omsom, an Asian sauce and noodles brand. As the children of Vietnamese refugees who grew up in Boston, they always loved their traditional cuisine, but they often felt ostracized by their peers for it. So, decades later, after stints in start-ups and management consulting, the sisters decided to quit their jobs and found a brand that would help build the world they wanted to live in. In 2020, Omsom was born, and despite a pandemic-era launch, they sold out of their original product line in 72 hours. Since then, the two have scaled up the brand, releasing new products like saucy noodles and partnering with Asian chefs to create unique recipes. Most recently, in June 2024, they were acquired by DayDayCook. Throughout the process, they’ve done all of this to increase access to authentic Asian flavors and break Asian cuisine out of the confines of the “ethnic foods” aisle.