Re: [CH] consumer opinion

lukasz (lukasz@midcoast.com.au)
Sun, 17 May 1998 00:18:13 +1000 

Judith Stone wrote:

 I would like to know what prompts you to buy one hot sauce over
 another.  What rings your chime,  

# 1
 - Ingredient  quality. Source small growers and help them to
grow with you. In the end you both profit. Plug here for
list members who shall remain anonymous, Jim, Calvin
would you both agree with this comment. I buy strings of
Garlic locally here that are hand cleaned and last 6-8
months. My source threw away 3/4 of a ton last season as he
didn't 
have the time to plait it all.{Gee whiz just think how much
sauce I could have made}.
# 2 -
 Heat is only important as long as there is a balance with
flavour. Don't overpower Chipotle with Habs, if its got fruit
make
sure the fruit flavor is there, don't try to make a sauce that
will strip the chrome from a 63 Caddy when something that just
melts plastic will do the job and sell about 10 times
easier. Just because some of us have a high tolerance
to pain {heat} does not mean that Joe Public has.
# 3 - 
Price, Here in Oz with our coin of the realm currently
buying USD 61 cents those AUD 15.00 bottles of sauces I should
have bought in march may well cost me 5 bucks more. 
# 4 - 
Colour {Aussie spelling}. If I can make a Sontava style
sauce and bottle it, that has a acceptable PH level,
is bright yellow/orange,and keeps for at least 3 months
last time I looked, why can't commercial canners? Same for
Reds and Greens.
# 5 - 
Labeling, Use a commercial printing firm to advise on
colours and lettering that can be read by at least 70% of the
Public.
There are some truly horrid examples out there. Kind of
remind me of art deco kitchens. As I use colours nearly
every day in the course of my work, I think I am sort of
qualified to cast judgment. {occasionally the
client want me to paint the walls white}.
# 6 - 
"What's in a name"? Well I have one which would probably
sell, say 5,000 bottles a month {easy} in the USA married
with a label that took me about 6 hours to come up with,
and no there aren't any pictures of buxom blondes.
Then again I wouldn't like to put just any old sauce with it.
 Although I could just rebottle Tabasco and still sell the same
volume. Only problems are I'd get sued, and if I rebottled
Tabasco I'd
get shunned by the list.<G>
# 7 - 
Advertising, I'll quote Abraham Lincoln "What kills a
skunk is the publicity it gives itself". Make sure the
product is up to the mark. Most of the sauces I have
purchased  have one shot at fame, or one trip out to
the bin. I don't think I have ever see an Ad for any of
the bottles on my shelf, so I'd say word of mouth 
or in our case Posts on the list from people who tried it
and liked it, not junk mail to the list.

                  Luke In OZ 

      Work is the curse of the drinking class -- Oscar Wilde

Standard disclaimers apply but I'll gladly take a back hander as
long as it's in anything except Aussie Dollars,Thai Baht,
Indonesian Rupiahs,Korean Won.  
"Greenbacks will be just fine".