The Entrepreneur Experiment EE450 - From Market Stall to 75 Employees: The Rise of Oishii Sushi
In this episode of The Entrepreneur Experiment, Gary Fox sits down with Ciara Troy, founder of Oishii Sushi, to uncover the 19-year journey of building Ireland’s most recognisable sushi brand.
From her first Saturday market in Greystones to supplying nationwide through Lidl, Aldi, Tesco, and Spar, Ciara shares the grit, resilience, and fearless naivety that kept her going through long days, cashflow struggles, and van deliveries at dawn.
She opens up about the pivotal lessons learned along the way: from cutting sushi rolls by hand on chopping boards to investing in her first machines, from maxing out family credit cards to securing Enterprise Ireland support, and from nearly burning out to carving out “Mummy Mondays” to balance entrepreneurship with family life.
If you’re an aspiring founder or a food entrepreneur wondering how to scale a product from a kitchen table to a nationwide household brand, this episode is packed with raw insights, honest reflections, and the strategies Ciara used to grow Oishii from a tiny market stall to a 75-strong team serving fresh sushi across Ireland.
Show Notes
In this episode, we cover:
🍣 How a semester in Tokyo inspired Ciara to start Oishii Sushi
🛒 Testing at local markets before breaking into Dublin shops with barcoded trays
🚐 The early years of 4am sushi-making, van deliveries, and scraping by on petrol money
📊 The “trays per man hour” Excel sheet that showed her the path to profitability
⚙️ Tiny improvements—like piping wasabi instead of hand-filling—that transformed efficiency
💳 Surviving cashflow crises, credit card debt, and the importance of family support
👩👧👦 Introducing “Mummy Mondays” to balance growing a food brand with raising three children
🏭 Scaling from a small kitchen to a purpose-built Dublin 12 facility with 75+ staff
💡 Why COVID was a turning point, forcing Oishii to shift from van sales to centralised distribution
📈 How Oishii went from 30% retail coverage to nationwide partnerships with Ireland’s biggest chains
🌱 Future of food: functional ingredients, protein-rich meals, and balancing wellness with convenience
💬 “Be patient with the results but aggressive with the action.” – Ciara Troy
Links & Resources
Oishii Sushi Website: https://oishiisushi.ie/
GS1 Ireland – Barcodes for Food Products: https://www.gs1ie.org/
The Spade Enterprise Centre: https://www.spade.ie/
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