co-packer Looking for copacker willing to make a small initial batch

apinyaco

apinyaco

Hi everyone, I'm new here so wanted to introduce myself and ask for some advice. I'm starting a Thai chili hot sauce business and decided it's going to better to use a copacker instead of bottle it ourselves but most copackers I've talked to require a minimum that's our of our range. Can anyone recommend a copacker that would be willing to produce a relatively small (somewhere from 5-50 gallons) batch as a trial run with the possibility that if we're successful we would return for a larger run?

Note that the copacker MUST be able to do an aseptic cold-fill of plastic bottles for our requirements. We are located in northern Virginia and somewhere local would be helpful so we can visit the premises, but would be willing to work with someone long distance.

Thanks in advance.
Adam
 
Sort by date Sort by votes
Cold-fill is because we really want to use a plastic squeeze bottle instead of glass.

Moderators, I think this post might belong better in the "Bottling, Packaging, and Marketing" forum but I don't think I can move it.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Hi apinyaco, welcome to the forum.

A couple co-packers I know of are-
Endorphin Farms
IPAC
Stage Coach Sauces

all are in Florida and I have not used any of them, so I cannot speak to their abilities or quality.

Here's other links-
http://www.specialtyfoodresource.com/page/page/4205553.htm

http://www.contractpackaging.org/i4a/pages/index.cfm?pageid=1

To expedite your process, have your recipe EXACTLY as you want it in the small batch with everything measured out to grams. Invest in a good grams scale, and make the sauce several times using weight measurements to make sure it's consistent.

Trying to scale up a recipe using "1 medium onion" just won't work well. :)

Good Luck on your process, and if you find a co-packer in your area, please post so others might find the information.

salsalady

Justaguy said:
They moved it for you. They are like ninjas, you rarely see them, but they get the job done.
Click to expand...

justaguy, I've been here 2 years and have yet to "see" a moderator. Do they really exist or is it another urban legend? ;)

:lol: OK- back on topic~
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Hey SalsaLady, just curious, if a recipe calls for the use of a fruit/vegetable... how do co-packers handle this? Say you had a recipe for instance that was 500mL mash, 500mL vinegar, and one lime per 1L (1000mL). Can they usually accomodate things like this?
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Alot of my sauces use fruits/veggies. I have made a couple of different batches and scaled the fruits/veggies each time and then took an average and used that as my measurement. Worked out pretty good!! Wish you all the luck finding a copacker that will do small batches......
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Pablo,
to your question about the lime...yes the co-packers can accomodate your ingredient of "one lime per..." but...they might send an employee to the store to buy a lime for your recipe. Will it be a big lime, or a small lime? Do you want the fresh squeezed juice, or is the whole lime cut into quarters and simmered in the sauce and then removed?

The best route for sauce making folks is to have the recipe detailed to say something like...
1/2 cup fresh squeezed lime juice

So it may take 4 large limes or 20 small limes...but in the end you would have 1/2 cup of fresh lime juice.

And if the lime is to be cooked in quarters in the sauce, it should also be measured by ounces or grams.

Does that make sense and/or answer your question?
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
I am looking for a capable co packer who can manufacture my three sauces. I need someone who can provide fresh ingredients such as Scotch Bonnets and Red Thai Chilies. All recipes and measurements are ready to go, just need someone to execute. I'm in Chicago but would be willing to travel for a good fit. thanks!
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
I wanted to follow-up on this thread in case it can help anyone who reads it in he future. I found several copackers who work with small batches or initial batches and each have different advantages and disadvantages. I still have not found the right copacker for our needs but will keep trying.

IPAC -- http://www.copack.com/
Knowledgeable, willing to work with startups and provide small batches; not very responsive to communications (still waiting pricing proposal after two weeks despite emails and calls)

Arbor Hill -- http://www.thegrapery.com/
Works by the hour and does everything by hand, will accommodate small batches; doesn't offer supporting services, you are basically paying for the bottling labor and you have to provide the rest

Stage Coach Sauces -- http://stagecoachsauces.com/
Full service for almost any development issues, well-organized; doesn't accept plastic bottles
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
As someone who's about to use one (next Friday - woohoo!) this subject is near & dear to me.

Some great info already posted (by sauce goddess SL, who else!) but maybe I can add a couple of other bits of info to help food for thought.

1. "1 lime per x liters" is nebulous - better "120 gm lime juice per 2800 gm liquid" and better still, "180 gm line juice in recipe" and let the mfgr scale it out with all other ingredients. A simple excel % calc will tell you if they've scaled correctly. SL is spot on here. Fruit comes in different sizes. Saying "1 kiwi" is meaningless. One lot of fruit can have more juice, be more ripe, etc - variables are recipe killers.

2. "small test batch" - as I'm finding out this is in the eye of the beholder. My mfgr has a 110 gallon kettle. His smallest test batch is 70 gallons, or 150 cases of 12 x 5 oz bottles. Any less and the sauce will scald, ruining the taste.
Plus if you're doing a test batch to determine how your product scales, making 10 cases is useless since it doesn't tell you anything if the end goal is 100 cases. You need to do a test run on the real equipment for it to be meaningful.
Find out your mfgr's equipment, and their min production batch sizes. If its too much for you it won't work anyway. Plus you have to be aware that a mfgr may not want to work with you if you're too small. 100 cases isn't worth the prep before or cleaning after if they can be cranking out 500 cases for someone else in that time.

Just like you're going to be careful in selection of a co-packer, they will be cautious about selecting their customers. If you're really small, the juice won't be worth the squeeze.

At that point you'd be better off sharing a production kitchen space or renting time in one or whatever.

3. Economies of scale - I've mentioned this on several topics. Choose a co-packer go makes products with simar ingredients to take advantage of their qty bulk purchases. Mine makes pasta sauce, so vinegars, roasted garlic, onions are all things they buy a TON of. This helps to keep my costs down. Since folks here are talking small batch sizes already, you'll need to think about price breaks for qty purchases especially....and if fir example you go to a grape jelly maker to produce hot sauce, you're going to pay a premium for your ingredients.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
If recipe calls for whole fruit though, I'd imagine saying 110g whole lime per X Liters is more useful. There's a big difference in the flavor of whole lime and lime juice IMO.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
It's all about interpretation there. If you have a recipe as "whole fruit" then you need to work to convert it. I agree there's a big difference - skin, pulp, amount of juice all factor into net weight of the fruit. If you're using whole fruit a mfgr may not want to touch you. Or maybe they have a calculator for whole fruit and l ow how to scale it better. If you're talking about lime it's much easier than say, kiwi or mango.

If you are using something like mango, the beSt you can do is "x grams of peeled, seeded mango" and let the mfgr scale it. Or maybe they want pulverized gm weight or something.

I'd still suggest giving them your exact (small scale recipe) with the exact TOTAL gm weight of the raw fruit in your recipe. They will scale it out. You'll make it harder on them if you say "I use 3.5 liters of x so I need 7.5 mangos per liter" - the easier you can make it on them the better is my point.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
identify what part of the ingredient you need for the sauce, how much by weight or volume, and in what form-


75 grams of peeled minced raw garlic or 1 cup garlic cloves (if you weigh out 5 pounds of peeled garlic by the cup, each cup will have a different weight because the size and shape of the whole cloves will fit into the cup differently and give it different weights.

For this type of step, the only solution is trial and error to get the ingredients converted to grams. Take your first measurements, make your small batch, is it enough garlic? or do you need to bump up the volume by weight?
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
salsalady said:
identify what part of the ingredient you need for the sauce, how much by weight or volume, and in what form-


75 grams of peeled minced raw garlic or 1 cup garlic cloves (if you weigh out 5 pounds of peeled garlic by the cup, each cup will have a different weight because the size and shape of the whole cloves will fit into the cup differently and give it different weights.

For this type of step, the only solution is trial and error to get the ingredients converted to grams. Take your first measurements, make your small batch, is it enough garlic? or do you need to bump up the volume by weight?
Click to expand...

Agreed - and just to kick this dead horse one more time, I am on my 3rd co-packer. All 3 have required ingredients in gm weight. No volume - all insisted on this from the getgo.

So the fruit is very likely going to have to be peeled/seeded gm weight. SL is spot on - saying "2 cups mango slices" is variable for the air pockets in the cup. I'm still not sure why you'd want to say "x amount per liter" when "x amount per recipe" is so much easier for the mfgr.

Remember - they won't know your yield unil they make it though they can estimate. But you can make your small hobby batches and measure the total amount of each ingredient in your recipe. If the end result tastes right & you have it all in gm weight, that's all you need to give to the mfgr for scaling.

And a nice byproduct is that if it doesn't taste right it makes it much easier to tweak components of the recipe when it's all in consistent units of measure like grams.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Some co-packers & bottles really wouldn't appreciate that.

They're running businesses - likely their own product line + however many companies they package for. Do you think they have time to entertain 500 calls a day from hobby hot sauce folks who want to run 1000 bottles of a non commercial product?

I am only speaking from my own experience, but the 3 I've worked with had minimum batch sizes that would be prohibitive to 99% of hobbiests.

There's also the fact that in CA if they produce an acidic shelf stable product, they need the state to test it. Which means correct legal labeling, company registration, etc. basically until you as a business have your ducks in a row they don't want to waste their time.

And it's all about scale. The 1st batch I did wasn't even a full day's work for the production staff - yet they needed to clean the entire line, bring in the ingredients, bottles, staff, fire up the boilers, etc, etc. The production chef had to take time to scale out my recipes, then calculate nutrition - from there I had to have my graphic artist change my labels to add nutrition panel, etc.

As such I would only be comfortable sharing my co-packer's name/contact info with someone who was very very serious about starting a business and who'd done 95% of their pre-work out of respect to my co-packer.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Lucky Dog Hot Sauce said:
Some co-packers & bottles really wouldn't appreciate that.

They're running businesses - likely their own product line + however many companies they package for. Do you think they have time to entertain 500 calls a day from hobby hot sauce folks who want to run 1000 bottles of a non commercial product?

I am only speaking from my own experience, but the 3 I've worked with had minimum batch sizes that would be prohibitive to 99% of hobbiests.

There's also the fact that in CA if they produce an acidic shelf stable product, they need the state to test it. Which means correct legal labeling, company registration, etc. basically until you as a business have your ducks in a row they don't want to waste their time.

And it's all about scale. The 1st batch I did wasn't even a full day's work for the production staff - yet they needed to clean the entire line, bring in the ingredients, bottles, staff, fire up the boilers, etc, etc. The production chef had to take time to scale out my recipes, then calculate nutrition - from there I had to have my graphic artist change my labels to add nutrition panel, etc.

As such I would only be comfortable sharing my co-packer's name/contact info with someone who was very very serious about starting a business and who'd done 95% of their pre-work out of respect to my co-packer.
Click to expand...

I would think they should have a minimum order size listed on their website, if they don't isn't that their oversight and not the caller's fault?

I own a service business and get lots of calls for services I don't perform, I merely inform the caller of that and offer the services I do perform. I don't get insulted or annoyed...It's part of business.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Thanks for your lead on another co-packer option. As electrical contractors, we also get calls for work we refer to others.

I'm leaning with LDHS on this one. If the co-packers were looking for noobie sauce makers, the co-packers would be trolling sites like THP and Chiliheads on FB and putting their name out there every chance they get. Truth is, to get a first time sauce through the process....it's a lot of time and effort by the processor and for the first batch, they might not break even when all the emails, and talking and etc etc time is taken into account.

Minimum orders really depend on the facility, their equipment, how they can make small batches and more importantly, what is the sauce? It's ingredients, it's processes....

Not sure how a sticky would work for co-packers as they are businesses and businesses come and go~~~~~


Thanks again for the lead, and feel free to post it when you see people asking for leads.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top