We recently connected with Jacob Cutino and have shared our conversation below.
Jacob, appreciate you joining us today. Naming anything – including a business – is so hard. Right? What’s the story behind how you came up with the name of your brand?
Growing up, my Trinidadian step father’s homemade habanero salsa was a constant in our fridge at home. After many test batches, I developed my own version of his spicy, flavorful recipe. Before turning this into a business, I was making batches of our original Habanero hot sauce at home for friends and family. Of course at this time the product didn’t have a name, so when people would talk about the sauce they’d say something like “have you tried homeboy’s hot sauce?” In 2015 when we first launched the business, the name “Homeboy’s Habanero Hot Sauces” seemed like a perfect fit.
We started out selling at our local farmer’s market, online from our website, and on the shelves of specialty markets throughout Arizona. A couple of years later, we entered into a partnership with world renowned pizza artisan, and James Beard Award winner Chris Bianco. Our goal of expanding our offerings and reach, while keeping the story of our secret-family-recipe origin story at the forefront, made us consider an even more personal re-branding. In 2017 we re-introduced ourselves as Cutino Sauce Co.
I feel an immense sense of pride seeing our family name on every bottle, and hope to continue the tradition of inspiring people to add spice and flavor to their recipes!
Jacob, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?
Most of my career has always been in food and restaurants. But food has always been more than just a job or casual interest. Combining my business experience and passion for all things culinary, we took a leap of faith in the Spring of 2015 starting a business based on one of my all time favorite flavors.
After years of fine tuning, I was finally able to reverse engineer my Trinidadian Step Father’s beloved secret habanero pepper sauce recipe and share it with the world.
At Cutino Sauce Co. we make habanero inspired sauces, handmade in small batches with fresh natural ingredients. Our line up includes our core flavors, Habanero, Jalapeño, Verde, and Chipotle. Our Ghost pepper sauce, and fruit based batches of Mango, Pineapple, Strawberry, and Blueberry are available seasonally in limited quantities.
We may be small in size, but we’re big on flavor. It’s not enough to make something to simply scorch your tongue. We’re more interested in creating the highest quality, artisanal sauces to ignite your taste buds, enhance your recipes and push the boundaries of flavor. We believe hot sauce can be just as versatile as a seasoning and condiment as any other pantry mainstay. Our balanced flavor profiles shine on everything from ice cream to pizza, salad dressings to burritos, oysters to craft cocktails, chicken or grilled veggies, fresh fruit and beyond! There are no limits to the fun you can have trying Cutino Sauce with any food or recipe you love.
How’d you meet your business partner?
Cutino Sauce Co. is a family business through and through! In 2015 my wife Natalie and I co-founded our company.
The first time she met my family, and tried the habanero salsa my step father always made, she was instantly hooked on the fresh, bright, fiery flavor. Natalie asked me why I had never made this for ourselves at home, so I got to work trying test batch after test batch until I landed on the recipe that became Cutino Sauce Co.’s flagship product, our original Habanero hot sauce! I was managing a restaurant at the time, and with Natalie’s encouragement, I quit my job to focus full time on growing our new business. We worked together on all aspects of the initial strategy and execution.
After a couple of years, we were ready to take the operation to the next level. A local friend and world renowned restauranteur, Chris Bianco had approached me a few times about joining forces to grow the brand. In 2017 we felt the time was right to enter into a partnership with Bianco, and have since expanded our reach and product offerings. Chris shares our commitment to and obsession with bringing out the highest quality flavors from the best, freshest ingredients available.
Can you talk to us about how your funded your business?
Our business was the definition of “bootstrapped”! When I took the leap of faith to quit my full time job managing a restaurant to focus all my time on Cutino Sauce, we lived off my wife’s salary for around six months while we got ready to launch. I maxed out all my credit cards and investments, and we were off! I always tell the story of how I was on the brink of needing to ask family for money, when we finally were able to set up a booth at our local farmers market and sold our first bottle of hot sauce. For the two years following, the business ran solely off profits reinvested into operations.
In 2017 when we joined forces with Chris Bianco, we used that investment to expand our production and marketing capabilities. In the future we may look into raising capital through funding rounds, but for now we’re growing step by step.
Contact Info:
- Website: cutinosauce.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cutinosauce/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/cutinosauce
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/cutinosauce
Image Credits
Shelby Moore