Adam and Sarah Winter co-founded the The Four Saucemen. Photo / Supplied
Adam and Sarah Winter co-founded the The Four Saucemen. Photo / Supplied
A Kiwi artisan sauce and seasoning maker is eyeing expansion into the US market after one of its meat rubs won a place at the world’s largest barbecue competition in America.
The New Zealand-made Manuka Hot Honey Rub from The Four Saucemen company saw off more than 900 entries toclaim sixth place at the annual American Royal World Series of Barbeque in Kansas City, Missouri.
Four Saucemen co-founder Adam Winter said in response to post-competition demand, the company would export to the US a shipment 10 times larger than previous orders and expand its range on Amazon as a first step to breaking into the huge US market.
The company, founded in 2019 by Winter and his wife Sarah in their home kitchen and garage with a start-up investment of $10,000, today sells more than 120,000 meat sauce, rub and seasoning products a year to customers in New Zealand and Australia and through online channels.
Winter said while the potential volume of the US market was the logical next step beyond the transtasman wholesale and retail channels, the company planned a conservative, staged entry into North America.
“While it is clear the demand is there, we need to have a level of investment where we can do it well — we are conscious the US is a challenging and potentially high-risk market and can be expensive to enter at scale.
“There’s two ways to look at the US. You can do it on a small scale with some independents, however, the easiest way for us to do it is with somebody like a major hardware supplier where they’ve got thousands of stores and you do one deal and give it exclusively to them.
“And that is a possibility we’d like to look at in future,” Winter said.
The company has so far focused on developing the domestic and Australian markets.
With annual growth of 20%, it sees good potential for expansion in these markets too, he said.
The Australian market was accelerating. The company now had a direct contract with the Barbeques Galore chain, which had around 100 retail stores, and a new distributor had signed up 20 new retail accounts in short order.
“We’re aiming to be in another 500 meat retailers within the next five years, which would be about a sixth of that market segment,” Winter said.
Adam and Sarah Winter are co-founders of The Four Saucemen. Photo / Supplied
In New Zealand, the company had 250 retail customers including supermarkets, big-box hardware stores and independent butchers.
It also supplied the hospitality and restaurant sectors.
The company’s name, The Four Saucemen, came after Winter and three friends entered a local barbecue competition and won.
“None of us were chefs, just backyard cooks and beer drinkers ... Sarah and I realised there was a gap in the market for a gourmet range of meat seasonings.
“We hadn’t found anything in New Zealand we really liked and often asked friends travelling to the US to bring us back some barbecue rubs that were popular online.
“When we tried them we were underwhelmed with the flavours so we set about creating our own.
“We designed everything in our kitchen and these are the same rubs we used in our international barbecue competitions.”
