BRINGING YOUR PRODUCT TO MARKET IS AS EASY AS 1,2,3... UM, AND 4,5,6,7.
Have you written your recipe down? Or do you "wing it" 'cause you're a rebel? So you don't make it the same way each time? Then you are not ready. Go away. Bringing a food product to market requires boring, boring consistency.
Come back when you have your recipe locked down and each batch tastes the same.
What's that? You already have a label designed? Least of your concerns at this point. And yes, that IS a lovely caricature of you. Nailed it!
So you lovingly peel your own garden-fresh tomatoes by hand? And gently roast garlic to coax the most flavor from it? Well, it ain't scalable, and nobody would notice anyway. And, your garden is not a legit food source. Do you enjoy paying lawyers?
Manufacturing is all about... anyone? Exactly, consistency.
You want to manufacture for resale? Then embrace being the Mickey D of salsa (or whatever).
We will help you revise and scale your recipe so you can make thousands of bottles, not dozens.
Now that you have compromised your principles and modified your recipe so it can be manufactured for a profit, we'll do a small production run so all those friends and relatives who egged you on to do this in the first place can evaluate the refined recipe and give their two cents worth.
And no, you still don't need a fancy label yet.
Finally! Time to break out that label -- and fix it. Can't have any intervening material (whut?), and you need to make sure all other FDA regulations are clearly satisfied. And that caricature of you in the label? Sure, why not, leave it there. You are your brand! And hopefully you are also magical enough that you can do samplings in different stores in different cities at the exact same date and time.
We will also help you select the right kinds of containers and lids.
Now that you are happy with your recipe and resulting product, you need the Man's stamp of approval. Why? Because in every bottle of your product are botulism spores biding their time until they can germinate in the just right conditions. Conditions your product is most likely dangerously close to providing. So unless lethality is your secret ingredient (not great for repeat business) this has to be done.
We can help you get through this, though be aware this takes time and is beyond your or our control.
Yay! Your recipe and label have been approved by the authorities. Time to come up with a chunk of cash to pay for labels, bottles, lids and ingredients. Not to mention our time and labor.
Being an artisanal producer, we don't produce hundreds of cases a day. But we can make enough so you can go out and begin selling and building an online and local audience for your product.
Now it gets real. Sure friends and family love your stuff, but what about people who don't know you? What about store buyers with limited shelf space and surly attitudes?
Here's where you find out if the world really needed another salsa or hot sauce. Hey, at least we got paid!
Good luck!
STILL INTERESTED? GOOD FOR YOU, YOU ARE AS STUBBORN AS WE ARE.
Yeah, we didn't know what we didn't know either when we decided to bring our sauces to market. So you can be stubborn and cheap, like us, and figure it out yourself, or you can pay us to help you through all the hoops you'll have to jump through. Either way, happy to have a conversation about your product. Swing by our facility in Falls Church and we can noodle through your product idea.