I'd never heard an origin story, either. The reason I'd heard of it, liked it, and buy it myself is because restaurants very conspicuously put it on their tables. If that wasn't coordinated marketing, then I guess it's luck. But was probably marketing. Even without a "sales team," someone had to be going to those restaurants and making deals with them.

And the irony is, the "you could find everywhere" bit is entirely down to the sales force he doesn't have (but his ten distribution partners do, and his Asian competitors didn't have in his target market for most of their existence)

I've got two different blends of Sriracha sauce in my cupboard, both from Thai companies and one of them even copying Tran's bottle style, but it wouldn't have occurred to me until reading this article that a particular Vietnamese-American brand was supposed to be the "authentic" one. He could have got the origin story out there to people who don't watch documentaries about hot sauce if he'd spent money on advertising though...

This is the first I've heard that there is a story behind it. I've got a bottle of it in the fridge right now. Perhaps some advertising wouldn't hurt.

You don't know the story but bought the product, so it's still working. Would knowing the story cause you to buy two?