Back Porch Hot Sauce

I've always been a lover of all things hot but was discouraged by the choices available in stores. It is either all vinegar with heat or all flavor and no heat. So I decided to create my own brand that not only added flavor but also had the heat.

      

The company began in 2012 when a co-worker gave me several hot pepper plants. I planted them in pots and raised them on the "Back Porch." Our deck is covered and large enough to hold the pots without compromising our other activities on the deck. When the peppers began coming in, the porch was overrun with them. I couldn't figure what to do with all I was harvesting without letting them ruin. I asked the friend who had given me the plants what he did with his, and he suggested that maybe I should try my hand at hot sauce. I found some bottles online and ordered a small batch to make for my personal use. I took a bottle of my first batch of hot sauce into work and gave it to that same friend. He tried it and said he really liked it. A week or so later he was asking for more, and the light bulb went off. I thought that if he liked it maybe I could sell to my friends and family to make some extra money. My first batch was thin but had plenty of flavor and heat. 

     

The next spring I grew peppers in my backyard as well as in pots. I made my second batch in August of 2013. I bottled it and labeled it in my house and was sold out in less than a week. I continued making batches until it was evident that I needed to form a company before Uncle Sam came looking for me. I started looking for a name to call my hot sauce, and since I started on the back porch, it only made sense to call it Back Porch Hot Sauce. It sounded rural, and I wanted to put an old dilapidated porch on the label. I pulled up some pictures of Eastern Kentucky porches online and found two that I liked. I showed them to my mom and asked her opinion as to which to use. We agreed that part of one and part of another would be the perfect fit. Since she is an artist, I asked her if she could draw it.  She took the photos and came back twenty minutes later with our label picture. I set up an LLC online, but before I could press the confirm button, I had doubts. I went to the One who could make me a success or failure in a blink of an eye, My Lord and Savior. After praying, I hit the confirm button and Back Porch Hot Sauce was born.

     

After jumping through every hoop out there, we finally received our commercial business license in spring of 2014.