We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Kristian Malcontento. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Kristian below.

Kristian, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. We’d love to have you retell us the story behind how you came up with the idea for your business, I think our audience would really enjoy hearing the backstory.

My wife and I are foodies and bourbon lovers. As we strive to buy unusual food products, we usually find many to be bland or contain so many artificial ingredients that we always cook from scratch. That included a beloved by friends and family bourbon beer BBQ Sauce. When we would be in bourbon-centric stores and locations we purchased food products containing bourbon and any spice and food enhancements. Unfortunately we found them all to be ordinary, disappointing, and mostly not tasting of bourbon as promised. So we launched our products, with an initial launching with our neighboring distilleries in Tennessee and Kentucky. We quickly built followings in both wholesale and retail customers once they realized that our sauces were amazing and tasted like the whiskey and spirits used in them. We were thrilled with the response to the product once they tried it and had to understand how to take this from a passion to a legitimate business. We knew that in this Nashville metro area, people were either passionate about their food or tourists who wanted great food experiences and products to take home from Nashville so we had a great response.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

I was born and raised in Philadephia PA where we had little to no BBQ Culture. My family and I moved around the US and while living in Fayetteville AR built a passion for all things BBQ including BBQ Sauce made with bourbon and beer. We make whiskey and spirit based sauces and spices that turn the ordinary to extraordinary and help people become the cooks they deserve to be. We want BBQ and non BBQ lovers who are foodies to know about our game changing, un rivaled flavored products.

How’d you meet your business partner?

My wife is my business partner. We met in a gym in New Jersey 30 years ago. We obsessively worked out and ate a lot together and still do today.

Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?

Once we started our business, my wife and I both still had corporate jobs. We knew one of had to be the first to run it full time so I quit first. First I was high on being my own boss and having all my time to dedicate to the business. Next I loved not wearing a suit and doing whatever I needed done, how I needed it done. Next I had to deal with a slower response time of those not operating in that corporate world and a different type of response from my customers and suppliers. This continues to be a struggle as I am a very structured person with my time and quality of work but it’s now the norm for me.

Contact Info:

• Website: thewhiskeyhound.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thewhiskeyhound
• Facebook: www.facebook.com/Nashvilleswhiskeyhound
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kristian-malcontento-562045240?
• Youtube: www.youtube.com/@nashvilleswhiskeyhound946

Image Credits
None, these are my own pics taken by me