Music to his ears: 'I can't get enough of your curry!'

Atlanta Journal Constitution
August 3, 2006
By John Kessler

Throughout the week, Moran receives orders on his Web site (www.currysimple.com), boxes up the shelf-stable foods at his small Poncey-Highland home and runs them over to the Little Five Points post office for shipping. Of the 10,000 hits he registers each month, he gets enough orders to keep him hopping, though not yet enough for him to quit his bartending job.

Still, he claims to be on his way to breaking six figures in sales this year. Not bad for someone who doesn't personally make the product and hasn't yet seen the factory in Thailand that does. In fact, Moran's never even been to Thailand.

No matter. It's his product, and he has faith.

Moran is tall, slender and 29, but so youthful looking that he must still get carded. He has sandy blond hair raised to spiky points and blue eyes behind geek-chic black glasses; when he talks in his animated, young-entrepreneur-on-the-go way, he seems like the second coming of Max Headroom.

"People can't believe it when they try this curry!" Moran exclaims. "They just have to take one bite, and they say, 'Omigod! That's amazing!' I have customers who call it 'curry crack.' Different customers. They try it, and they're addicted! They have to have it!"

Moran got the idea when he was working as a bartender at Surin in Buckhead. (He still works in the same location, which is now a Thai restaurant called Rama 5.) He and a Thai colleague, Nimitr "Lim" Harimtepathip, noticed that the largely American customers loved the restaurant's curries and often said they'd eat them at home if they could.

The two devised a plan to work with a large food manufacturer in Thailand. They would have heat-and-serve curry sauces — red, green, yellow and masaman — made to their specifications. Customers would need to heat only meat and vegetables in the sauce and make rice.

The first samples arrived in frozen packages. Moran distributed them among friends and customers and solicited feedback. And ...?

"Oh, my God!" Moran says, shaking his hands in the air for emphasis. "They freaked out! Literally. Everybody ... freaked ... out!"

The way Moran describes it, this doesn't sound like a wholly pleasurable experience. It's as if one moment these people were eating dinner, and the next found themselves in the middle of Peachtree in silk pajama bottoms singing tunes from "The King and I" to passing cars.

But I don't think that's what he means. Rather, the recipes met universal approbation, and the curries were a go. They would be packed in shelf-stable pouches of eight to 10 servings and sent via a Bangkok-Los Angeles cargo ship and then a freight train to Atlanta.

The two business partners also ordered bottles of Thai tea concentrate and a stir-fry sauce for pad Thai.

Moran designed the Web site and went live with it on Jan. 2, only one day past deadline. The first order came in within the week: one package of red curry for a man in California.

Aside from some cost-per-click advertising on Google and Yahoo, Moran let the word get out slowly, word of mouth, omigod by omigod.

His first big break came in March, when he called The Washington Post (Moran grew up in suburban Maryland) to see if it'd be interested in a story. As it happened, a writer was looking for young food entrepreneurs to profile. Moran went to the Post office for a photo shoot, where he said the awesome deliciousness of his curry preceded him.

"It was unreal," Moran recalls. "People were coming up to me at the Post and saying, 'Omigod, are you the Curry Simple guy? I can't get enough of your curry! It's sooooo good!'"

Moran worked 'round the clock filling orders pursuant to the Post article but soon decided it was time to work on the local market. So two months ago he set up a stall at the Saturday morning Green Market at Piedmont Park, where he enticed potential customers with samples. Despite the early hour, people lapped it up.

"There was this one lady who had never tried curry before. And she freaked! She loved it! She said she couldn't live without it!"

I worked through the scrum of curry tasters at the Green Market one recent morning and picked up several pouches to take home to try. Thankfully, I did not freak out after eating them but will attest to their excellence. These curries (particularly the red) are better than many I've had in Thai restaurants, with clean flavors and complex layers of spice. They are all a bit on the sweet side for me, but that is my frequent complaint about Thai food in America. Nothing a squeeze of lime juice and a splash of fish sauce can't correct.

Also, the iced tea concentrate is great. You just add water, ice and milk or cream for a sweet, sweet treat.

Moran thinks his company is poised for a major breakout soon. Brisk business at the Green Market accounts for 25 percent of sales. Cook's Warehouse has picked up the line for retail sales. A Thai restaurant in a little town in Indiana has put in a standing order.

And he's working on a coconut soup with lemon grass, which, the way Moran describes it, sounds like the new Thai stick.

"This soup is incredible!" Moran assures me. "It's got so much lemon grass in it it's going to blow your mind!"