Sandra Craig’s sauces adding a power-punch to your BBQ
Ministry of Business, Press Release – Saturday, March 02, 2019
Imagine this. You know how to prepare a decent barbecue, but you have special guests to impress and you need an ingredient with a power-punch to boost your dish from nice-enough to eye-popping-good. What do you do?
Sandra Craig assures that her sauces will add the flavour you require.
Marketed under the label “SS B-B-Q Sauce”, Sandra’s products are a huge hit among local barbecue lovers, from expert chefs to backyard grillers.
Barbecue connoisseurs agree that a good, thick, flavourful sauce is essential to get the best out of grilled meats. Some use just a smattering of sauce for a gentle, subtle flavour; others believe a good dollop is the only way to guarantee finger-licking goodness. It doesn’t matter if you’re the “smattering” kind or fall into the “good dollop” category; Sandra promises great results.
Many satisfied users swear that the unique flavour, texture and taste of Sandra’s sauces have a magical power to supercharge barbecues. This reputation seems to be richly deserved, and it is a fitting reward for a resourceful Guyanese entrepreneur who has been able to transform her homemade-sauce recipes into a range of top-quality sauces suitable for both local and international markets.
It all started in 2014 when Sandra, a food vendor at the time, had a wonderful idea. She wondered what would happen if she added carefully selected natural flavours to enrich the deep flavours of her homemade barbecue sauces. With this in mind, she added pineapple to store-bought sauce and …voila! She knew she had a winning flavour.
Encouraged by this success, she continued to experiment by adding honey, other sweet local fruits and a few secret ingredients. Since testing —and tasting— the results, Sandra hasn’t looked back. She had invented a remarkable range of new sauces with unique, delectable flavours, which she knew would add visual interest plus a burst of flavour to any barbecue.
She resolved to produce a distinctive local product that people would want to buy again and again, and she thought incorporating her sauces in her food vending business was the best way to go.
Sandra said people loved her barbecue sauces and were captivated by their unique smokiness and exotic, balanced tastiness. “People are shocked when they come across them…when people taste the sauces, they are amazed,” she said.
Sandra said she quickly established her initial range of sauces, which included pineapple, golden apple, tamarind, sour-soup, mango, passion fruit and a version made with ginger and garlic. Recently, she expanded her product range to include a special sauce for chicken wings called “Spicy Fusion”, as well as a sweet-and-sour sauce that can be used primarily as a dip or marinade. She has also introduced a type of pepper-sauce that contains bilimbi (known as ‘souree’) and pineapple, which has a flavour similar to pickled ‘achaar’.
Sandra pointed out that her sauces have a distinct competitive edge because they are prepared for wider use than enhancing barbecued meats. In fact, she expects them to be used as marinades, delicious dips, as well as to augment stews and roasts. Additionally, she only produces her products with fresh ingredients from the market.
It is probably no surprise that the pineapple sauce is Sandra’s favourite and she promises that it adds a new dimension to the ever-popular chowmein dish.
Giving her preferred preparation method, she said she marinates chicken with the pineapple sauce, and then stir-fries it until it is thoroughly cooked and golden brown. After mixing the fried chicken with stir-fried vegetables into boiled and strained chowmein noodles, she adds more sauce for even more flavour. “It’s delicious…” she said.
UncappeD
Based on her customers’ positive reaction to her sauces, Sandra was finally ready to scale up production. She decided to test the market by putting them on show at GUYEXPO, and she was pleased with the public interest, acclaim and increased sales generated by the exposure.
When she heard of the Guyana Manufacturing and Services Association “UncappeD” event to promote the products of local entrepreneurs, Sandra made sure she got on board.
She decided to market her sauces as a line of authentic and flavourful Guyanese condiments and, in the process reinforced the fact that Guyanese have the ability to produce, package and market high-quality products. And her sauces were an even bigger hit. People who attended the event now look forward to her participation in and many ensure they take home at least one bottle of her sauce.
With this success under her belt, Sandra is preparing to participate in this year’s Marketplace UncappeD at the National Stadium on March 31, 2019, where she will also once again market one of her latest products—coconut water with lemon, a product she calls ‘Lemon Burst’.
Sandra has come a long way since she first started concocting homemade sauces in her kitchen. Through a long and slow process of elimination, she has tested and adapted her sauces to better meet the demands of her customers. She can now bottle and label her products in larger quantities, but it is still a small-scale business.
One of her main challenges as an entrepreneur in the agro-processing sector is getting enough capital to expand her operation. This would allow her to produce ample quantities quickly enough to fill large orders, to supply supermarkets adequately and even look at opportunities to explore overseas markets.
Humble, natural ingredients are central to Sandra’s sauces, and she has to be very conscious of food safety. She knows that expanding her business will also warrant a significant investment in safety measures to eliminate potential points of risk. It all comes down to getting capital, and this is where she sees the biggest future benefit of her participation in Marketplace UncappeD.
Sandra knows that the UncappeD event attracts financiers and investors along with potential customers. As she sees it, sooner or later someone who can help her to get the capital she needs to take her business to the next level will attend the event and be impressed by the popularity and quality of her sauce.
Meanwhile, Sandra is producing enough sauce to earn a living. She also wants to help other agro-processors and is encouraging them to bring their products to be sold at her shop in Orange Walk between Regent and Charlotte Streets.
Her advice to agro-processors is, “Whatever is your dream, bring it to reality. Put your stuff out there…do not give up. Life is about trials and tests. I never gave up on my dream.”
Gwen Evelyn
Communications Specialist
Sagacity Media