Twenty-five years ago, two sisters started making chocolates in Santa Rosa, inspired by a candy shop across the street from their parents’ nail salon. Wendy Lieu and her sister, Susan, co-founded of Socola Chocolatier, a San Francisco institution celebrated for weaving Vietnamese flavors, from pho and sriracha to guava and durian, into handcrafted bonbons and truffles. With a flagship shop in the Mission and a location at San Francisco International Airport, Socola has grown from a home kitchen experiment into a beloved Bay Area destination. We sat down with Wendy to hear the story in her own words.
What inspired you to start Socola Chocolatier?
Our parents had a nail salon and just right across the street were these candies. We’d walk by every day and eat a free sample. And after eating all those samples, I just wanted to learn how to make chocolates. So I found a recipe in a magazine and I started experimenting, and I came up with a fresh chocolate made with fresh cream and butter and chocolate that was locally processed. It just tasted completely different. The flavors that were available were really just these commercial flavors, like dark chocolate, milk chocolate, raspberry caramel. And it gave us this opportunity to create something that was different. We wanted to showcase our Vietnamese heritage. So that’s where we came up with Vietnamese coffee, guava, passion fruit, sriracha, durian, and even pho chocolate.
Was chocolate common in Vietnam when you first started out?
When we started, chocolate was not common in Vietnam. It was actually not even grown there, coffee beans were. But as time went on, they started developing cacao alongside with coffee. It actually is a product that is grown in Vietnam now. It takes roughly seven to ten years for the fruit to be mature enough to make chocolate out of. So we’re seeing a lot more Vietnamese cacao and Vietnamese chocolate nowadays versus when we started in 2001.
How has the community, including the Vietnamese community, responded to what you’ve created?
People love our chocolates. It allows us to showcase our Vietnamese flavors. A lot of times people are very surprised and delighted to see some Asian flavors incorporated into chocolate, and then specifically Vietnamese. It’s definitely something that’s surprising and fun that people like to share with other people.
What should someone expect when they walk through the door, and what are the must-tries?
We have one store in San Francisco in the Mission neighborhood on Folsom Street, and also at the airport. If you don’t make it out to San Francisco and you’re just at the airport on your way out, we’re at Terminal 3 by the United terminal. I hope that you are welcomed by friendly staff, you get to try a sample, and you get to learn a little bit more about our company. One thing I would like to highlight is our Little Saigon box, which is a four-course Vietnamese meal in the form of chocolate. It has Vietnamese coffee, jasmine tea, then a savory course with pho chocolate and a sriracha truffle. Then we move on to dessert, which is fruit for us, so guava, passion fruit, lychee, and durian. And then cognac as a final chocolate, which is supposed to represent karaoke or the end of the night. We also have a lot of seasonal offerings for holidays like Lunar New Year and Mid-Autumn Festival. We just hope you get surprised and delighted by the experience.
What do you love most about being a small business owner, and what keeps you going?
Being a small business owner obviously has its challenges, but it definitely has its rewards as well. It’s everything about it, the journey of every day being a little bit different. You have to love challenges and like to solve problems, because every day has some kind of problem. But everything is enjoyable because the overall aspect is that we get to create something and share with the world something that doesn’t exist before. We get to create these really cool flavors of chocolates that can be gifted and enjoyed and really make people happy and spread joy. It’s nice to always be part of a community in creating these products and being able to share them.
Is there a customer memory that captures why you do this?
There’s so many customer memories over this amount of time. I definitely enjoy seeing people of all ages enjoy chocolates. We have regular customers who come and visit us and buy chocolates for their friends, or for themselves. Honestly, any customer experiencing our chocolates for the first time, it brings me absolute joy.
At the 25-year mark, what are you most proud of?
Starting the company as just a party of two, me and my sister, and having those initial dreams of, what if one day we could sell in Whole Foods, what if one day we could stand up for making something that doesn’t exist. That’s so amazing, that’s what we’ve always been trying to do. Putting that goal out there but not knowing how long it will take to get there and who will be on this journey with you to achieve that. You just keep moving forward and people will support you. Days are hard, but if you put the intention and the passion out there, people will help you get there.
What does “spend like it matters” mean to you?
During the pandemic I was really trying to find my Vietnamese community, and I found it in the arts and in literature. I’m always trying to represent and showcase other businesses. Getting to know the makers, getting to know the businesses and why they started them, that matters. Today I went and bought lunch from a Vietnamese cafe and talked to them a little. I love talking to other businesses and building communities. Just get out there and get to know these small businesses.
Socola Chocolatier, San Francisco, CA. socola.com
