Ex-market vendor spices up life with som tum business

But she didn’t stop there. Somkid began developing a ready-to-eat som tum product and, two years into the business diversification, sales of the popular Thai traditional dish got under way this year.
With the positive response from the market, the company she set up has now achieved annual sales of Bt10 million.
“I started my working life when I finished primary school and worked with my older sister to sell fresh vegetables and fruit in the fresh market,” Somkid, 50, of Pathum Thani, said in an interview with The Nation recently. “Twenty years after I began working with my sister, I learned how to process vegetables and fruit and so I started making items like preserved vegetables and pickled fish, using Bt2,000 of my savings to get started.
 “Then, with the good response from customers, I established a manufacturing plant and my company, MT Agriculture Process Co Ltd, with registered capital of Bt1 million, three years ago.”
Somkid said that after the plant started up, in Klong 12 in the Lamlukka district of Pathum Thani, she began studying how to boost the production output through the freeze-drying method for food.
“I researched the best types of Thai food for freeze-drying until I settled on som tum,” she said, referring to the traditional dish from the northeast that is made mainly from papaya and is served with a sauce that includes ingredients such as lemon juice and fish sauce.
“I took two years to develop the product and that involved testing the market by distributing free samples of the product to my customers early this year.”
Somkid’s ready-to-eat som tum, with the freeze-drying process, requires only that the customers add water, as per the directions on the pack.
After having distributed 1,000 of the packs to her customers, during the product-testing period, Somkid was buoyed by the response. Her customers began buying the product and the sales prompted her to invest up to up to Bt10 million on a new production line to produce the ready-to-eat som tum, also known as spicy papaya salad. Production under the new line began earlier this year.
Somkid sells the product under the brand Mae Tuk, after her nickname. She has since enjoyed success in the domestic market and abroad, the latter through customers that are exporters. Social media has also helped sales, as customers spread the word on the ready-to-eat traditional dish.
 Somkid said the company plans to develop new flavours for the som tum, such as vegetarian, pickled fish and seafood, to appeal to more and more customers.
“I learn what the customers want and aim to make products that serve their demand. This is the key to my business success,” she said.