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What you’ll hear in this episode

• Going from musician to hot sauce
• Staying all-natural and true to the brand
• Jumping into a crowded category

George Milton the CEO and co-founder of Yellowbird Foods started off as a musician playing in dueling piano bars but has since grown a hot sauce empire. It all began with George’s love of thick hot sauces but a distaste for the high sugar content in popular Sriracha brands. He and his partner were trying to cut out processed sugary foods but were unable to find an alternative for the sauce, so they made it themselves. They created what became the natural hot sauce, Yellowbird, and shared it with just friends and family until people began coming up to Milton after his gigs asking if he was the hot sauce guy and had any for sale. After seeing the demand for the sauce, they began selling it in local Austin farmer’s markets.

From the start, they knew they wanted their product to be all-natural and free of preservatives which they found to be harder than they thought. The co-packers did not want to stick to the natural ingredients in the recipe and wanted to use more processed alternatives, so Milton and his partner decided to get a kitchen space and make it themselves.

They took a chance by jumping into the crowded hot sauce category. To differentiate themselves they set guiding parameters such as ingredient lists, staying all-natural, and making a quality product.

To hear more about the Yellowbird story, how they got their start, and how they’re putting out a better for you product, tune into the fourth installment of Packing Taste! If you enjoy it then be sure to share with friends and colleagues, and you can click here to listen to more Packing Taste!

Host: Axel Brave

Guest: George Milton

 

Transcript:

this is a family media podcast hi everybody welcome to another episode of packing taste to they were doing things a little bit differently where recording live at the long center here in Austin Texas first we’d like to thank Richard rainwater and brains use for hydrating us and keeping our brains active during a crazy week here so today we have George Wilson co founder and CEO of yellow bird foods a kick ass all natural hot sauce company that has built quite the community here in Austin and now is nationwide welcome 

thanks so much for having him happy to be here yeah of course man of course some I think we’ve picked a good day looks gorgeous outside south by is is popping off have you caught any shows this weekend I have not I was out of town for the first part of it okay but I will be downtown tomorrow so I have a pass and I have it but you don’t need that if yeah he was no me they see me coming yeah yeah will I mean every time this is probably the fourth year I’ve done south by and I’ve gotten away with all the baggage you’ve really done there so many like off off venue things that are in the dark are bad now that it’s really like its own event because music starts it starts Wednesday so it’s like a five day thing but it starts kind of the week before and everyone’s every bar every penny you has a live show right yeah it’s great yeah but that’s what Austin’s like all the time yeah true true just on set on brain juice this week yeah 

do you have a you have any crazy self by stories that we can add up men crazy south by stories will I it before I was doing a hot sauce I was a bar musician yeah so I’ve played not not in south by shows but I’ve played downtown or like deer in south by in the south by miss official unofficial always on AA I’m a totally unofficial guide so well nice which I was gonna ask you about being a musician because I heard that was last me about a man yeah so that so you started to use the hot sauce stuff kind of started with you being a musician right yeah I was I mean we moved here from Houston in two thousand twelve and I was a full time musician at the time so I didn’t come here with the idea to start a business or to make a hot sauce for a living yeah one instrument well I was I was doing I did piano barley doing piano bar okay for lines are you familiar with those are no no no no no I’m familiar with the piano she heard yet over four okay that’s a starting point but still like doing piano bar is a secure you got to pay to folks playing the piano and yes okay so across from each other and its rambunctious and you get people to sing along yeah and you have people on the stage and there’s it’s all I mean it’s a cover music great and what does it was at like at one place or were you trying to land gigs all over time so I did I played when I was hard to take a piano around you’re right yeah I’ve tried to but it says so I was doing it at one place for a while and when I was in Houston I was playing full time in a place called Pete’s which is now down Houston and there’s one here too on sixth street so I play there I’m actually playing tomorrow night so if you’re in really out to be right in the middle of the south by well there you go that’s gonna go see Georgia tomorrow the other time is there a yeah it’s a it’s a two it’s all night long ago but I I was doing that when I moved here when I first moved here I was literally like dragging not like a not a piano but a lot of these like when you do live piano shows a lot of it is is like a keyboard it’s a full length waited you know eighty eight key keyboard and you put in a piano shells so like a wooden replica okay so you’re just taking the key so you’re not bringing the whole sound board of the PM right because that’s what’s like super heavy and then I actually built some like grand piano shells and I would just take and I had a sound system and I would just travel around so when I first moved here I was literally on the road for three out of four weeks of of the month yeah on the road here in Austin or to go on this is all over the place yeah yeah doing bar shows doing you know playing weddings Yang whatever so I moved to Austin to play music and I ended up out of town more than yeah yeah and you that kind of like I mean trying to land young gigs and essentially being your own boss as a musician and kind of did that give you some sort of framework two I think the sauces so I think that being a being a freelance musician because before I did pan of our stuff I played in bands and I went you know I played in bars which a lot of that is just a lot of like booking yourself a bars and I don’t do a lot of it now anymore I I don’t have time for it I just kind of pick up stuff every now and again yes I stayed you know I can still I still got it in a calm but a lot of being a musician is is just kinda schlepping around from bar to bar and like this is why you should hire me and I’ll you know I’ll come due Wednesday night for free and you know just I’ll donate the cover whatever like just stuff to it’s just a hustle yeah because the like playing a gig is not the hard part you know the hard at like ninety percent of the hard part of being a musician is getting a gig at a gig and then you know get it and then like getting enough gigs to where you can support yourself yeah like you’re not completely starving you can like make a bit of a living and have a place to live yeah all this sort of stuff and then probably another like eighty percent of the difficulty is like getting your gear there and setting up and then yeah once you’ve got the gig and you have your gear there like Lang is kind of the easy part as long as you like just a 

yeah cells gonna say like kind of in business is like you have this problem and that’s like the biggest problem which would be landing the gig once you land the gig than you have okay when I need to get all my gear there and need to make sure it’s all work and gathers analogies Mandel sort of yes yeah then once you all the gear everything’s ready is like all right now I got to make sure that these people of my music well it so it’s kind of like you finish a problem tackle the next one yeah well I think that that that flows into what we’re doing because so yellow bird saw us I was making this saw the is that you know I was making the sauce is before we even moved to Austin and it was it was years it was it was years in the kind of in the process of it becoming a commercial thing and you were making the habanero one I was just making the habanero and your friends and family is just it was a it was literally just so the reason we started it was because we like me and my partner Aaron we moved here together we started the company together Erin is your partner and co founder yes correct and Aaron does she is in charge of all our marketing and branding should all of the label design on the bottle design she did our website design and so she is I think she works way harder than I do she’s working right now while I’m here talking to you yeah but the initially when I was making this stuff I was so I used to use I used to use a certain brand of Sir acha size I’m not I’m not trying to actively through other products under the bus but there there were there there’s a lot of sugar and kind of traditional Suraj aside for this kind of chili sauces that I really like that thick consistency something you could like squeeze on and kind of the sweet spiciness of it and I tried for awhile to find something that was like I we both are trying to eat cleaner you know like as you start getting older I guess more important to you know kind of be take care you email yet yourself and be mindful what you’re eating and what you’re doing so we were trying to cut out things like added sugars and you no preservatives and just stuff like that and the hardest thing to get rid of was the was that sure Sir Russia sauce and so I started looking for like there’s got to be a healthier version or such a company that’s kind of using and you start looking at twenty twelve right this is will when I first started making it was like twenty ten twenty eleven okay I was looking for stuff and like twenty ten and I was like all the all natural the no preservative stuff is yeah starting to ramp up well it’s the it’s certainly like a big deal in the world but it it’s may it sort of made its way to condiments slowly yeah and and certainly like and hot sauce it’s been even slower a sort of one I think in the as I’ve learned more about it that’s sort of one of the places were the arm where where it’s slow to catch up to the market like hot sauce yes not generally a trendy you know like if you’re an if U. coconut water something and you’re not paying attention to trends than that’s yeah I don’t know not Butters like almond butter and things like that but okay Sir 

so you were going back you were at your house making the sauce you like I’m not gonna put potassium sorbate resent them come here in the us at my house I’m gonna make it normally ray and make it like a normal ingredients yeah like stuff that you would make for your family that like you would be happy with that yeah giving that that I could like we’d be happy by eating myself yeah it so we’re just making it at the house and I was kind of like giving bottles to friends of mine and stuff just to like a try this what do you think you know like and they would ask for it I imagine like yeah well at first I mean the first I don’t know twenty or thirty versions of that sauce were terrible you know because it was like a I was trying to figure out I was trying to solve some different problems like consistency lake how do you get how do you get a good like thick sauce that sweet in like savory at the same time without adding all that crazy stuff so there are a lot of different things that I put in there and and for a while I was actually fermenting I was fermenting size sent ended anybody teach you how to do this stuff that your mom teach how to cook there was a lack thrones on now well I got I got into cooking so my first job ever was I I cooked at a I was a cook at a at a wing restaurant okay a sports bar and grill and I was like fifteen so you’ve always been kind of like a hot sauce that was my first experience with the size of the I. Kerr I was cooking at this like sports bar when I was fifteen and I lied about my age on the application because you technically had to be nineteen or eighteen or nineteen to work in a kitchen yeah at the time in Alabama but like my mom would like come pick me up at two in the morning from working at this job when I was fifteen years old but it was that they had like a work release program there and so is literally as me and a bunch of guys who got Bustin from like the county to him and there is a guy there from Louisiana on the student am Rhett who actually had he had the same mustache that I’ve got guys you just listen and I got a big handlebar mustache and that’s the that’s a throwback to my buddy right but he wouldn’t shoot like then they have like a nine one one sauce or something it was like the spicy sauce and when he was feeling sleepy you’re like not into it he would come in and he would do like a shot of yeah nine one one sauce so that was kind of the for the allies first experience with spicy food 

okay and then when one was the moment when you’re like well you know people are asking me for this I’m gonna start maybe bottling this in larger quantities take it did you take it to farmers markets data that will the first airing of fans the first thing I I think the first thing that set off in the story that I kind of like to point to is like when did when did we decide to to make it something more than something we just made it home was like I would I was here is playing in bars around town and and I was you know letting people try it and there are folks so at the time there is a guy there’s a friend of mine who had a corn dog stand on sixth street in downtown Austin and six street in Austin is kind of like the Bourbon street of Austin that’s like where everybody goes to starting at a bar playground yeah so like a friend of mine had a corn dog stand on it on six street in Austin he was like Hey man would be cool if I looked at some of the sun you like put it out of my corner like Stannis like okay that’s yeah that be cool and I started late because I made like as a musician and bands and stuff like I made several studio albums that you know that I was promoting when I came here and so is always like playing shows and like and like Hey I got albums for sale like doing the holy musician hustled area and and it kind of slowly became this thing where like people come up to me like on my break or something and be like Hey man like I enjoyed your tunes on my came and I gotta albums for sale you guys wanna I’ll I’ll give it to you for free and they’re like no no no I don’t an album because that guy who makes you make a hot sauce like my brother told me as in here and you have to and I was like yeah I mean I I make hot sauce to enjoy my music though right yeah yeah they’re like yeah I know that’s cool that’s great it’s really it’s fine but can I get some of the hot sauce and so I just as soon as things are like people come in and be like do you do you have that you have hot sauce and and so selling hot sauce and not selling any albums yeah and I would say it’s just kind of like you know I’m pretty hard headed and it was like one of those things where it took it took awhile for it to sort of click and then I I kind of came home one day and I was like as Aaron what if we like tried to sell hot sauces and at the shows or just not at the shows just I mean the general first years so like I was just like selling it like I sold so I’ve sold a lot of hot sauce like out of my trunk in parking lots in making some shady stuff it’s a fruit Hutchinson’s Housel but it was really like we started taking it to farmers markets after that fear Austin here in Austin yeah so we we sat down and figured out like what do we want to do is sit Sir 

Erin’s background as and design and branding brand management stuff like that I I don’t have I don’t necessarily have a keen eye for her I know when I like something but I don’t I I don’t have any training in that in that aspect and she very much does yeah so they’re kind of a lot of conversations in a lot of work around what like what do we want this to be as a brand before we you know this is just a like wanted at a farmer’s market and we just let it be a cool like a cool project yeah that we’re doing together yeah sure and kind of it sounds like you guys know knew what you were good at and she was good at these things you’re good at these things the rolls to the roles kind of like fall normally yeah when we when we had to I mean at first we were just both doing whatever you know like when when it all of a sudden became a thing that we were selling and we would once we did farmers markets we started selling to local restaurants and stuff side literally just like spend all week making not sauce and then drive it around to the handful restaurant yeah here in town and so we kind of decided that my job was everything inside the bottle and her job was everything kind of outside so little night that’s how we defined it for for the first I mean really that’s how we would still defining yeah but that’s what’s on your resume yeah I do and stuff yeah yeah this is my business card George Milton in delivered last night about a guy nice nice and 

then you guys for sure like this from day one you like we’re gonna do this all natural there’s no reason to at all this funky stuff we’re gonna scale but I don’t want any preservatives and it was kind of like was it a normal realization that you could scale this stuff without adding this ingredient for a long Javadi or this ingredient to make it more can consistent yeah I mean I think that in the way the food manufacturing has been like that for a long time is that is that you go in when we started looking at because initially when we started getting a more stores there’s some a I don’t know how much your listeners know about the food industry here how much anybody knows what the food industry but there is there are there are companies out there known as like co Packers are coming you factors so you can take a product to them and it’s their kitchen it’s their staff and they make the product you know for you yeah and then you basically like market and distribute the so we first started getting into more stores we we went to some different co Packers again not naming any names but it’s pretty standard in that industry that you bring a product and and like I would bring I will bring one of these products and I would say this is this is what we’re making you know we use carrots we use fresh habanero as we use fresh garlic you know we’re using like citrus juice organic vinegar I think you know like I was like here’s were using here’s a product we make here’s the process and handed off to him and they would do a test batch and they’ll be like okay we well instead of carrots we found this carrot puree product from dell Mante that has forty two ingredients in it and it’s like whey protein isolate and then xanthan gum have to be a scientist understand what’s and I’m like that’s not can you do like I just use carrots use a carrot yet here’s a carrot take this carrot and lake cook it and bundled up with like some papers and stuff and they’re like oh well that’s too much processing time the like we just basically want to lay down some stuff and mix it up and put in a bottle and I went through that a number of times and we so let’s just say let’s just find a kitchen space in yeah make it ourselves yeah so we just we make it ourselves yeah and I think most co Packers and again not to dog on any manufacturer but they’re they’re they’re good at the manufacturing side so they try to minimize costs here speed up production here because it’s not go Packers it’s not just your brand they’re dealing with their live twenty other brand will and a lot of and a lot of coke crackers it’s a very it’s a it’s a model that’s not that’s not optimized to make a better product necessarily so they’re generally getting like a tolling charge so the make some set amount bottle you know they’ll make eighty cents a bottle yeah NO twenty twenty Bucks a unit debate you know then there’s Quebecers for on not just in the food industry but I mean like electronics and clothing and a lot of for everything everything like most of the stuff that you buy is not manufactured by the company who’s selling it to you even if yeah they kind of position at that way but like you go when you go to a co Packer it might be like in the early days we were talking to co Packers who specialized in like hot sauce and salsa and because our product is different it’s like the sticker to its not chunky salsa but it’s also not like it then you know like vin agree so that they’re in nobody was optimized to make this specific product they were they were like well we can make it as a pepper sauce we can make it as a chunky salsa and I’m like that’s not that’s not what it is yes like well in order to you know and through no fault of of these companies it’s like well we need you know two hundred thousand dollars and of different equipment to make exactly what you’re making yeah 

and so sees arm okay so trying to manufacture hot sauces that’s so for for those listening in those who don’t know this is a very crowded category in the retail space in the grocery space and the food service there’s especially here in the south and Texas like there’s so many hot sauces and you guys were creative enough bold enough to say we’re gonna do this right so what kind of what what advice you like what what strength city guys play on to say we’re going to go into this crowded category and just totally dominated like what where was the starting point with that process what I don’t I don’t think that we came in and said I I mean certainly certainly Mike were very optimistic people I think you have to like come in with a certain you note any category I mean so like any category you can think of is crowded unless you’re inventing you know a new category saying yes you’re inventing thirteen ice cream or something and now that’s a new category the I think any category it’s like well if you come in and you’re making anything if you make saucer Hama Sir you make a salad dressing or like there’s funny those out there yeah but the hot sauce hot sauces was there’s a lot of hot sauces there is a lot of candy bars and a lot of chips I would do I think that is I think that what we did was we we came up at the it in the very early stages like I told you that we planned it out wait what is the brand stand for what is the it’s like what is it all what what are like what Hillary gonna die on with this product the end we set just a few you know parameters it’s always going to be you know this is always going to be the ingredient list it’s always going to be natural and healthy it’s going to be food that you can put on your food to make it taste better so you are really thinking of competition and like squeezing into a need we were thinking about life we’re gonna make yeah product will because we because we didn’t come from we didn’t come from the world of retail or manufacturing or we didn’t come from this world where we sat down on day one and worried about the data we didn’t worry about the date on day one what we said was like we’re going to make this product and see what happens N. Blake we I mean we worked our asses off at every stage of the game and it’s always like we you know like we’ll get to we’ll get to a certain level okay we were and grocery stores like that was our first milestone was like we were in grocery stores I was just too like when we when we got in the grocery stores it was two grocery stores but it was a milestone because there’s there’s a lot of things that you have to accomplish you know getting permits getting manufacturing license it’s like going through a review process with the grocery store like figuring out how to you know how to manage like being on the shelf and keeping up with the recurring orders and links was a milestone getting into grocery stores and then we said like every milestone we’ve heard we’ve kinda said yes and what else yeah so for a for us it’s not you know I think that I think the L. Bourzat bus hot sauce in the world yeah I’m pretty biased you know I mean people were the only people all the time that have tried our stuff and they’re like well I like this other brand better and I’m like that’s fine may like every like to taste thing I mean because our stuff takes a certain way it you know it’s it’s a little more expensive than most hot sauces because we use better ingredients yeah you know because we’re not using you know first ingredient like first ingredient water second ingredient sending third ingredient sugar that’s not what our label object that does a cheap things together right and at and 

how would you teach the customer that like this is what we’re doing it’s a it’s a hot sauce but it doesn’t have all those other ingredients did you guys do that through demos through like online marketing at first I mean yes like any place where people would listen to us and now when and there’s it’s very crowded so it’s hard to it’s it’s it’s hard to I think in twenty nineteen it’s hard to have really meaningful conversations with people because they’re so my ready got so much does a lot of conversations yeah yeah and there’s a there’s a there’s a lot of conversations that honestly are more important than what’s your favorite hot sauce but we just we just kind of like our strategy is just to stick to what we do really well and you know we do hot we do hot sauce very well yes so no no definitely that’s totally what it seems like the and did food service help a lot did you guys because I know whenever I go to stores and do demos that’s soaking for us because people are trying it education right there and then but I feel like food services when someone sitting down at a restaurant they can for sure try that not just on a plastic spoon but on their food and really yeah yeah well with any condiments I mean with anything that’s a that’s additive because our our stuff is complementary like very few people eat hot sauce by itself in there there are plenty of people who do just like those people are all there all on our Facebook page you’re only ever so we do you know we we’ve had people like like do you like the yellow bird challenges you to like a shot of a like ghost pepper sauce or would you know I didn’t invent that is the land yeah there there’s people that like hot sauce people are crazy people like I don’t know how many houses people you know but I know a lot of yeah yeah yeah they’re not saying a fanatic but so we I mean yeah like having having people try because it’s hard to know it’s hard to know if you like a hot saucer Jimmy cherry or a catch upper musters heard a note if you like it just tasting it by itself so you have to put it on yes the food service helps but it you know demos help but food service is better than demos just because people etcetera if you come in if you like okay will cause like a demo we can only you know we can only bring one or two things to try it on like here’s a chip yeah try hot sauce on it’s not like people sit around just like I’m skin eat a snack of chips and hot yeah you gotta make so some tacos or something yeah but we can’t you know like it’s unreasonable for us to say like okay we’re gonna make tight we’re gonna make tacos to order at a demo for four hundred people right yeah beautiful and it’s like a woman everybody’s got you know because we do a lot of natural grocery stores whole foods in places like that were you you have a lot more people who have her particular about their diets are so it’s like if you if you say okay we’re gonna sample it on eggs you know we’re gonna have some script were scrambles mags and like just tried on a yeah there’s a lot of there’s a lot of people who shop at whole foods who are vegan yeah right Saturday’s were they’re allergic to eggs yeah or you know it’s like if you do and we do chip sometimes and it’s like well are these gluten free other gluten free will not only my gluten free but I also am grain free yeah wells so you have to get a lot of shit you can’t yeah you can’t it you can never like get something get one thing that’s gonna work learn body 

so okay and so being a Texas brand have you seen like a lot of support within Texas with with other brands manufactures marketers whomever like what what are some support systems you’ve had here that you like about Texas or what is what is some hurdles that you had to get over because you were in Texas yes great question so hard I mean hurdles wise you mentioned before that there’s a lot of it’s a crowded space certainly a place like Texas there’s a lot of sauces barbecue sauces hot sauces salsas so there’s there’s competition here’s a lot of people you know people have a lot of different companies doing this sort of stuff that are vying for their attention and vying for the you know vying for their dollars at the check out counter on Amazon or whatever but the really cool thing is like in Texas even in an event not just in Texas but like there there are a lot of a lot of other companies in the food spacer making food products who are you know who really cool in others there are some people that will that will be kind of snobby about it and then make a product in this this competitive in like sometimes it gets it sometimes I guess all dirty yeah out there but I I I I think by and large an especially in Texas sleek new brands brands are mostly lake elaborating and getting along and stuff and we work with a lot of other there’s a lot of great food makers in Texas you know in Austin and Houston that’s what we’re covering here yeah yeah so you know like Dallas like all over the place there’s great food scenes both restaurant scenes and manufacturing scenes but we really enjoyed working with Texas brands mom we do it all the time not a collaborations lot exonerations yeah would you give away is or will collaborate talked about the demos in stores so we’re always like trying to collaborate with other Texas brands on doing a demo or doing an event or something like that and the other thing about Texas is that people in Texas love buying Texas products so yeah there’s a lot of pride here there’s a lot of state pride I think every state has a certain amount of state pride but I certainly think the not I don’t I don’t think any state has as much state pride as Texas and you you guys can fight me on that but I would disagree I’ve I’ve lived in a handful of other states and and like at the people just post about Texas is in and it’s all true yes it has a live in Texas you’re you’re missing out yeah 

can you share like an aha moment you recently had a like a a milestone you guys just reached home and those are always the best villains I’d say I feel like I have an aha moment every day I am a I’m a I’m a thick headed guy so yeah something will seep through like on a weekly basis but we did take as far as milestones we are we just launched a organic certified line which were talking about earlier but not with the microphones on so yes Sir we just to launch a certified organic this guy right right then there’s the there’s three other flavor so we we lost that nationally with whole foods happened last week so that was it that’s a project that’s been literally like five years in the making is it was not an easy thing to do yeah you have to get your your facility certified and ready to go so facility certify we also had to find suppliers for organic Chiles yeah so which one of the things that we do that that is a little different from from what other hot sauce brands is that we use fresh chilies and that’s really difficult yes like from a supply chain logistics standpoint you guys wrote some of the does all hot sauces today roast there we don’t researchers okay that’s a that’s a flavor it’s kind of flavor preference okay yeah like roasted Chiles have a very specific flavor to them so that we don’t do any rested our ghost peppers are smoked okay which is a lot of you guys smoke them we don’t yes smoke on that we haven’t smokes nice arm so any any specific advice you have for new food entrepreneurs because everyone starting food brands nowadays but like we said here in Texas that just popping up left and right is there some a key piece of advice you can share I think probably to the really key pieces of advice like number number one the authentic because yeah because there are so many things out there there’s so many different versions of in this not just not just for food but for any new brand I think that is really important to be to be authentic and specific with what you’re doing like don’t just put more stuff out into the world put out you know like you were talking about your chin Missouri and this is something that and I know I’m not pronouncing the ours right you guys have any other cheesy mutually Iapetus can do over time Jimmy jewelry that’s beautiful you’ve been in Texas line if you should have the double art and I know I know but I mean embarrassment yeah I guess anyway the stuff you make that stuff that you said several times yeah like you made that you made that for your family growing up when you’re a kid it’s very authentic that you would put that out of the world I think that that’s like the first most important thing like don’t just there a lot of companies who came in and said like well the data shows that you know spicy products are trending and they’re on the rise and so should manufacture a product you know like that’s not authentic like as many layers of marketing and whatever that you put on top of that like it’s not an authentic start yeah to a brand and I’m sure other people who have had monetary success doing something that way but if you ask me for my advice I was it yeah with authenticity and then don’t be afraid to ask for help yeah I I certainly in Texas there’s a great scene here in Austin like I’m fortunate to live in Austin for a lot of reasons but one of the reasons is that there are a lot of people who have served a great food brands here who I can go ask you know we’ve been if it able to avoid a lot of potential pitfalls because I could call somebody up and buy my coffee and silly Hey what did you guys what did you guys do when you launched in grocery stores or what are the things I should try to avoid the then I’m running into this problem what do you think about yeah yeah no definitely I think the so those two points are awesome because the authenticity part I think when you’re scaling for long term success being authentic and true and passionate that’s kind of the first stage and then the data analysis and and the differentiation I think that’s like the second tier stuff where it’s like okay I love my stuff people of my stuff this is my recipe now let’s see where we really fit in where we can really squeeze let’s look at that the data but I think you’re right like having that often taken not putting that authenticity and not putting something else out in the world that’s already there like we don’t need another Tabasco there’s already Tabasco you know and then the second part which ask for help like you said here in Texas is I think it’s key and everyone is so helpful and I always say like that’s real southern hospitality like you can ask your neighbor or your food neighbor whom ever like you said like a what did you do when you got into a whole foods like what some strategies and everyone seems to be so helpful yeah and it changes I mean everybody said a different experience yeah and early and all retailers are you know adapting and things change drastically every year yeah might not be if I go you know get advice from somebody about launching an internationally with whole foods and they did it two years ago it might be different yeah yeah but they can they can certainly like set a framework for you know how I think about it yeah okay one of the last questions I like asking my guests and I’m gonna ask you this obviously but how do you how do you manage of what you want to do with what you should do with what you have to do it’s a confusing question so what you wanna do you wanna everyone average hot sauce yeah what you should do is probably scale in an appropriate manner right and and what you have to do is like well I have to pay my employees so kind of in a sense like that because what you want to do what you should do and what you have to do I think are all very different things yeah a huh huh man I wish I had guys that are there in question no no but I mean I think it’s a good question and we’ve certainly like dealt with the how do we manage growth how do we manage you know like managing managing finances when you are growing you know fast is hard to do because your expenses next month they’re gonna be very different than your Jess’s expenses this month yeah and I even read the one of your one of your articles about like being able to give something up when you have to so that that falls into that question is like I want to do this but maybe I should cut ties now and cut my losses now yeah we try to do that and I think that that’s I think that the I think it’s fairly is sort of like popular knowledge in the in this in the start up community in general or with the entrepreneur crowd that you want to like fail fasts right what is the what is the term there I I can remember I can really good at Phil fastfill forward failed fell fast fell off yeah you got it yeah the real fast fill often so it’s I I mean with us it’s it’s one of those things are like we try a lots of different stuff we’ve tried different packaging options we’ve tried you know different strategies with our teams like growing a team is especially sales and marketing like growing your growing the team is hard because it’s hard to figure out exactly what the next thing you need to because you think it’s one thing and then you hire for that and then maybe it’s a little bit different yeah and so what we’ve tried to do is is be very like just kind of be very honest and accountable and say like Hey we’re doing this you know like I try not to go I try not to be too these are all my recipes you know but I try not to be to the lake have too much of a big head about that it’s like I have something you know we’ve released a much a small batch stuff along the way some things have been more popular than I thought they were gonna be so like our ghost pepper sauce print and since was only supposed to be a small batch thing people kept asking for it for and so that it became a regular item yes court system there’s funny other things were like will release something as small batch thing and it’ll be like that’s you know people like it is not working and will have to cut it and I’ll be like now well that was some of the losses yeah yeah so we try to not you know not waste more time and money that there’s this fallacy of like through that a you know a lot of people a lot of companies to about throwing throwing good money after bad which is essentially when you say I’m gonna stick with this program because I’ve already invested so much time and money in it and we try not to do that I think it’s irresponsible yes growing company to be spending the time in my you know very limited resources on something that is not helpful if you know that it’s if you know that it’s not helpful then yeah stop doing it as fast as you can come and I think rigor in a growing our Hannah managing managing what we have to do with what we want to do we want to make everything in a lake course like it’s once you get into the food industry and you probably have experience some of this yourself you go into the store and we had we had this experience over the you know the last six seven years of we went into the store we said Hey there’s a there’s a gap in this hot sauce section there something that we want that doesn’t exist and so we created it and it was a big hit right so now that is like in my brain right when I’m like in the store and I want something that doesn’t exist yeah yeah course I see it you know I see a an OB you know I’ll make a recipe for something home or whatever and a billing him this is this should be out in the world I think we could do this and I have to check myself because I’m constantly doing our indie stuff and the fact that like I’ve been making different products at my house you know test products like every week for the last seven years and we only offer this year we only offer like five thing yeah that I think is is a little bit of a testament to like the restraint and focus that we try to have with what we do yeah I mean I you know starting a food brand I love

 I love it and I’m sure it’s like you’re just saying right now it gives us the a reasoning to cook everyday right a contest stuff here and there so I’m totally glad that there’s a lot of people doing that out here in Texas but yes No that where gonna have to wrap up here but I want to thank the long center again and Richard rainwater and brain Jews for again sponsoring us hydrating us keeping our brains go in thanks Jill yeah and George pleasure having you on the show I hope I hope we’re teaching the community the community a little bit more about food and manufacturing here in Texas but yeah if you guys haven’t tried yellow bird to go out to your local whole foods or some other other all natural stores nationwide and the sauce is a kick ass on pretty much everything so thank you guys for listening and we’ll talk to you guys next week