The Original Vadai downsizes from 13 to 8 outlets with more closures coming, owner says 'need to stick to what we can do'

Once booming with 13 outlets across Singapore at its peak, The Original Vadai has scaled down its business to eight outlets today.

More closures are also coming, food critic KF Seetoh wrote in a Facebook post on Jul. 3.

In an accompanying video, Seetoh chats with Stephen Suriyah, the owner of The Original Vadai, about the closures.

"I think I need to downsize, so that... I can control the quality," he explained. "Too many outlets, we cannot control the way our staff works and all this kind of thing."

"I'm not a smart businessman," he admitted. "I learnt, along the way, a lot of painful mistakes, a lot of costly mistakes."

He was "most peaceful" running two or three outlets, he said. Running many outlets, however, gave him stress and a financial burden.

Ambition

The Original Vadai's roots began in 1989, according to its Facebook page.

It was a family business that started when Stephen's mother found a way to create a fluffier and lighter version of prawn vadai (dough fritters) to cater to Singaporean taste buds, according to a gov.sg profile story on Stephen.

After Stephen's father passed away, the family's financial struggles prompted him to drop out of school and take over the business at 18.

He told Seetoh he was ambitious in expanding the business to 13 stalls because he wanted everyone in Singapore to know what vadai is.

"When I first joined my mom, when I tell people I sell vadai, nobody knows what it is... they will ask, 'What is that?'" he said.

"I wanted it to reach people. That's the reason why I expanded."

Good responses initially

When Seetoh asked if he was being greedy, Stephen explained that the demand was there at the time, and the business had good responses when they opened many outlets.

The Original Vadai's first brick-and-mortar store opened in Golden Mile Food Centre in April 2020.

In the profile story, Stephen recalled how a Facebook post he made about its soft launch went viral, and the queues were "crazy" by the second day.

Within two years after that, he went on to open 10 outlets.

Lessons learnt

While commending Stephen's desire to promote the heritage of vadai, Seetoh pointed out that he had not thought carefully about the operational and manpower issues in Singapore.

Stephen acknowledged the mistake and shared two lessons he has learned from it.

The first is to keep the business within "whatever you can touch, whatever you can control", as he believes it will be rather difficult if the owner tries to expand the business and delegate control to other people.

He also believes now that sometimes "we just need to stick to what we can do rather than be too ambitious".

Despite the uncertain future of The Original Vadai, Seetoh concluded the video optimistically, saying that Suriyah will be reconsolidating to "come back stronger".

Related stories