Founder Story · Seattle, WA · 2024–2025

I built a scallion pancake business from scratch. While working a full-time job.

Absolutely chaotic, rewarding, and the hardest thing I've ever done. Also the best.

Dedicated to my mom ♡ Jen

$0K

Revenue Generated

Markets Operated

Team Members

Pancakes Made

Bright colors for a fresh brand

Hot off the grill, chili crisp on the side

Making my first dollar

The Origin

Inspired by my mom. Built for a generation of immigrants like me.

"When I was 3, my family immigrated from Yunnan, China. Growing up, I felt embarrassed by my culture and hid where we came from."

I even changed my name from Ma Hejing in third grade to Jennifer (because of JLo).

That started to change when I set out to record my mom's recipes. I began following her around the kitchen and scallion pancakes were the first recipe she taught me. Her way of saying "I love you."

Somewhere in that process, for the first time, I felt proud to be Asian American.

★★★★★

"The texture on these is SPOT ON. Totally dig it."

Chef Ruffin

MagnoliaOriginal

★★★★★

"OMG. Please! We can't live without them."

Izzy & Margaret

U DistrictSpicy Beef

★★★★★

"It was gooey with the egg and spicy and crunchy and yummy. The best thing for breakfast."

Sofie

Columbia CityBreakfast Sandwich

★★★★★

"So good! The best thing I've ever eaten for breakfast."

Joseph

U DistrictBreakfast Sandwich

★★★★★

"They're amazing. I wish I had room for more. So glad we discovered you!"

Susan & Marc

U DistrictSpicy Beef

★★★★★

"I think about them every week. Coming in on the weekend to grab another one."

Jess & Ari

MagnoliaOriginal

★★★★★

"Actually came back for a second round! It's our favorite thing here."

Anna

Columbia CityBreakfast Sandwich

The Build

From idea to real revenue.

2023

Recipe Development

Started with a Google doc called 'Mama's Recipes,' tested multiple batches, flours, and techniques. Hosted a tasting party for my birthday to refine the flavors. Decided on two SKUs: Original and Spicy Beef.

Spring 2024

Admin Sprint

LLC formation, Seattle business license, WA state license, Dept. of Revenue registration, Seattle Fire permit, temporary food permit, and booth operator application. Secured a commercial kitchen at a local pizza shop rent-free thanks to a relationship I built with Ryan.

June 7, 2024

First Market: Madrona - with Mom

Revenue: $542. I won't forget my mom being there and making my first dollar. Learned everything about setup, throughput, and crowd management in 4 hours. Full of anxiety, but came back two weeks later.

September 2024

University District Market

First U District market: $1,228. Recognized higher foot traffic and began prioritizing this market. Started selling frozen packaged units and doubling production.

November – December 2024

First Hire

Added pop-ups at two other markets for the holiday season. Hired my first employee, Colin, in November.

February 2025

Breakfast Sandwich Launch

Introduced the scallion pancake breakfast sandwich to increase margin and try something unique. February 15 became our best single market day: $1,578.80. Noticed stronger repeat customer behavior - an early signal of product-market fit.

March 1, 2025

First Market Without Me

Team ran University District solo. My spreadsheet note that day: "Alex did a great job." Proof the team could function without me.

March 2025

Viral Reel

An Instagram Reel centered on the shame Asian Americans feel growing up hit 500k+ views. The brand was resonating far beyond the farmers market community - right as the business was approaching its close.

Spring 2025

Wholesale + Wind Down

Secured the first wholesale account. Assessed the opportunity cost of markets versus scalable channels. Made the decision to stop markets.

Sold out breakfast sandwich 🍳🥓🥑🌶️

The Vision

Markets were the start. Grocery was the goal.

Growing up, freezing food was how my family did things. Aromatics prepped and frozen, hundreds of dumplings wrapped by hand, tomatoes from our garden frozen to use year-round. My mom's way of taking care of me was sending me home with frozen food she made herself.

The freezer aisle at every American store is full of orange chicken, General Tso's chicken, and nothing that looks like what my parents cook. I was going to change that.

"I wanted to build something that belonged in my freezer."

Jen holding the first frozen oo-mami package

First frozen package. A surreal moment.

Operations

The real work behind every market day.

Running a food business was not an easy side hustle. It was an all-consuming second job.

4pm–1am

Monday Prep Window

Every Monday, when the kitchen closed to regular business, was prep day. Sessions ran with three people for seven-plus hours. I tracked every batch obsessively: flour type, water ratio, yield, notes. The entry "29% water - Perfect. Don't change!!!!!" is still in my spreadsheet.

50 lbs

Equipment Per Market

Every market required loading and unloading: three grills, three tables, tent, sandbags, two coolers, wagon, signage, propane, ingredients, and consumables. Setup and teardown in 20mph wind and rain.

6 mo.

Free Kitchen Access

Secured a commercial kitchen at a local pizza shop through a relationship I built - rent-free for approximately six months. Thank you, Ryan.

Team Members

Five of the six team members had Asian roots, and that was intentional. Asian Americans share a lot in common, but each story is distinct. The team reflected that. Wrote job descriptions, interviewed, onboarded, trained, scheduled, managed, and paid out $12,000–$13,000 in wages on time.

🇰🇭 Alex, Cambodian 🇻🇳🇨🇳 Annie, Vietnamese & Chinese 🤝 Colin, Ally 🇨🇳 Denise, Chinese 🇰🇷 Kevin, Korean 🇯🇵 Robbie, Okinawan

Pancakes Per Market

U District consistently led in revenue, averaging 94 pancakes per market. Madrona, U District, Columbia City, Magnolia, plus pop-ups at Lunar New Year Night Market and Molly's Bottle Shop. Each market had different throughput, demographics, and logistics.

100%

Handmade

All 3,500 pancakes were handmade by me using traditional lamination techniques - every layer pressed, coiled, and cooked by hand. Scallions sourced from a local Asian American–owned farm. Every pancake made by hand, the same way my mom taught me.

The team: Kevin, Colin, and Jen at Columbia City

"This was the best job I ever had, and it helped me make rent during the winter." - Colin, first employee

Out of everything, this is what I'm most proud of. That's the fucking shit right there.

Marketing & Brand

Taking care of you. Food from your Asian big sis.

Oo-mami is built on a specific cultural truth: many first- and second-generation Asian Americans were born under the one-child policy. They don't have siblings, often have strained relationships with their immigrant parents, and few people to support them.

I was born under the one-child policy too, but I had a big sister. This brand is my way of passing that relationship along: a big sister who sees you, takes care of you, and doesn't shame you for who you are.

Learned

Shame as a story worth telling

One Instagram Reel went viral with 500k+ views. Centering on the shame Asian Americans feel growing up proved the storytelling angle resonated far beyond the farmers market.
Learned

Deliberately anti self-care

Self-care doesn't work for this community. Asian Americans have been told their whole lives to be self-sufficient and achieve the American dream with no one to lean on. They want to be taken care of and food is how that happens.
Learned

Individual identity, not a monolith

The brand had to be me, Jen, one specific person with one specific face and story. Fighting the monolith meant being individual identity-first.

Financial Transparency

They were right. Food businesses have slim margins.

~$0K

Total revenue

Best single day

Wages paid

Raised externally

The pancake had 63% margin per unit. Strong product economics by any measure, but distribution killed the margin. A single market day required 3 people × 7+ hours of prep, plus setup, teardown, fees, and my own uncompensated time. Market labor alone exceeded all ingredient costs combined.

Unit economics per pancake

Product	Price	COGS	Margin
Original (fresh)	$12	19%	63%
Spicy Beef (fresh)	$13	21%	62%
Frozen 2-pack OG	$22	37%	50%
Frozen 2-pack Beef	$24	38%	49%

Target COGS for wholesale viability: 20–30%

The path forward

The path was clear: wholesale, not more markets. The unit economics just needed more time to get there.

The honest reality

$32K revenue, but not profitable including full labor costs. Oh well, still a success by every measure that mattered.

Revenue by market (relative volume)

U District$14,837

Columbia City$5,130

Madrona$4,199

Magnolia$1,938

Lunar New Year Night Market$1,503

Wholesale$908

For the curious: full P&L

Revenue & gross profit

Retail sales	$31,252
Wholesale sales	$908
Total revenue	$32,159
Cost of goods sold	$6,123
Gross profit	$26,036
Gross margin	81%

Operating expenses

Payroll & wages	$9,074
Vehicle & transport	$5,176
Licenses & permits	$3,824
Market fees & supplies	$6,540
Kitchen rental	$1,850
Consulting	$3,625
Square fees	$1,112
Insurance	$631
Advertising	$491
Other	$2,451
Total expenses	$36,775

Bottom line

Net operating loss	-$10,739
Asset sale (equipment)	+$3,700
Net loss	-$7,039
Founder labor (unpaid)	Extensive
External funding	$0

A -$7K net loss on $32K revenue in year one, self-funded, while working full time. Not bad.

Why It Ended

Why it ended. I just couldn't continue.

Kitchen access changed

The pizza shop that had generously offered their kitchen couldn't continue indefinitely. Securing a new commercial kitchen in Seattle meant significant cost and a full operational restart.

Rising minimum wage, rising labor costs

Seattle's minimum wage increased to $21.30/hr in 2026. This meaningfully changed the labor math when factoring in payroll taxes.

Opportunity cost of markets

Each market required 15–20+ hours of prep, labor, and logistics. Time spent on markets was time not spent on wholesale, scalable production, or the next chapter.

Team turnover after maturation

Rebuilding a trained team from scratch - after investing in hiring, onboarding, and development - would have required a full restart cycle. Combined with the other factors, that tipped the decision.

First market, June 7, 2024 with mom, sister, and boyfriend

"The hardest part was admitting I needed to stop and take care of myself."

Running a food business while working full-time took a real toll on my mental health. After closing, I went home to my parents, took three months completely off, started seeing a therapist, and began an SSRI to recover. The decision to close was a decision to take care of myself.

Lessons

What I learned after a year of therapy.

On My Dad

I thought our family ending up in America was just luck. Then I went back to China and found out my dad is basically a legend in our hometown. Post-Cultural Revolution, he fought his way to the top of his university class to get a postgraduate spot outside China. Almost no one did that.

"My business was dedicated to my dad as much as my mom."

On entrepreneurship

For a long time I was insecure about the fact that I didn't quit my job, didn't risk it all, didn't go all in.

"I thought that it meant I wasn't a real entrepreneur."

Now I think that's absolute bullshit. Entrepreneurship is not a moral identity. I chose to start something within the constraints of my own situation, and that absolutely counts.

On belonging

A year of therapy after closing taught me the most important thing.

"I didn't have to do this to belong in America."

My place in America doesn't hinge on being a successful entrepreneur. I had nothing left to prove. Taking care of myself was the only metric that mattered at the end.

On being here at all

As the second child, I never knew how I was able to be born under the one-child policy. When I went back to China, I learned it's because my family has Hmong lineage, an ethnic minority identity I didn't even know I had, and it exempted us from the policy.

From there: we left China, landed in the UK, then Canada, then the US. And now me, in Seattle, here, now.

"When I was in the depths of depression, sitting with the sheer improbability of my life healed me."

★ Inspired by Mom

My mom's American dream.

My mom had always wanted to sell her food. Oo-mami was how I made that happen for her.

♡ Jen