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Dr. BBQ,
I am fellow Lakeland”er and have seen you at several local events. My Daughter Melissa who is 13 is a Que Freak! She has already won Overall Grand Champion in the Kids”s Que for her Ribs at the 2005 Mulberry Fine Swine at the Pit and First Place for Chicken in the same contest. The Judge in the contest told us that Her Ribs were better than the Professional entries she had tried. She was very serious and even asked if I had ever competed… Which I replied… not yet. Several of the pro-teams that entered the contest sampled and judged the entry and were asking all sorts of questions and were blown away that this skinny little kid produced that kind of results from a bullet smoker. Yes, I am a proud Father! She and I have been “practicing and experimenting” with sauces, rubs, techniques etc. We cook almost every weekend which pretty much drives our neighbors crazy from the smell. We still cook on the bullet smoker and a hybridized gas grill that I rigged for smoking which works like charm. Melissa loves your book and can"t wait to meet you the next time you are in town. Melissa will be competing more often now that she has a taste for the Trophies! I attached is a photo of her after her first win. Look at that Grin! I wanted to know if you can direct me to a company that would package her very own.. “Sweet Melissa”s” Sauce and Rubs Or if we should package and distribute them our selves. She has already worked up a logo and everything!
Robert
Hi Robert and thanks for the nice words.
Thanks for the nice picture of Melissa and her trophies too. Congrats to her. I look forward to meeting her soon. What you need for the products is a co-packer. Most of them will have a minimum of at least a couple hundred gallons and will require professional labels which mean professional artwork, setup, plates and a minimum of a few thousand labels. If you’re willing to spend for this you’ll then need to do everything you can to sell it. The other option is to do it yourself and sell it in small quantities to test the market. In that case you should consider “canning” the sauce for safety and you should also consider liability insurance just in case. Here’s a primer from a friend of www.fiery-foods.com . It’s about hot sauce but the same rules apply. http://www.fiery-foods.com/zine-industry/schy.html Selling BBQ sauce is a business like any other and requires all the same support and investment as any other business venture. Hope that helps,
Dr. BBQ
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