Pepper of the Month clubs?

AJ Drew

AJ Drew

Googling around looking for examples of Pepper of the Month clubs.  I can find Hot Sauce of the month clubs, but nothing for fresh or dried peppers.  Was thinking about offering one.  Fresh peppers on season and dried peppers off season but not sure how such a thing would work.

Do you think it would be monthly subscriptions or buy a year at a time for each season?  Any thoughts would be great.
 
Sort by date Sort by votes
Well,he who's name shall not be spoken starts done of those. Of course he subsequently faulted on all of those promises but....he charged a one time fee from what I gather.

It'd be easier for you to collect once. Easier on customer to give once unless you have an auto pay feature but...that requires a level of trust as well.

Personally I like the idea. But realistically AJ, knowing what you charge for summer boxes, it might not be worth it financially. It might be though. Indomt know you're situation.

I think you'd be a good candidate to start anew though.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
We subscribed to Kitnipbox for a period of time due to a decent trial offer.  Part of the value was the hand made story behind each product in the box.  It would be great if there was a story behind each pepper, maybe food / beverage pairing or flavor profile tips.  It would be even better if the seeds were viable.  Not only do you get to try a new pepper, but you are educated on it and have the potential to grow it next season!
 
I'd vote for a year at a time if the value was there.  Monthly would be the popular option, but yearly sub seed money would help kick things off. 
 
Only caution is commercial food production and distribution regulations with the FDA... not sure how those would play in. 
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
I think a pepper of the month club is a great idea. I run one of the monthly hot sauce clubs, and I'd recommend you check out Cratejoy, a website and billing provider that is designed to handle these clubs. For two years, I did everything manually on a spreadsheet and switching to Cratejoy was the best thing I ever did. Makes printing shipping labels and handling re-billing (for month to month subscriptions) really easy. 
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
The idea came from a TV commercial and my ongoing desire to grow year round..  Once a week or once a month depending on the package, a company sends you fresh produce and a recipe to make.  Its like a family meal in a box.  Horribly high price but really looks like fun for people who ordinarily dont cook from near scratch.

So asked wife and daughter, they came up with a really cool idea but again depends on growing year round.  For December, lined with white tissue paper, red and green peppers.  For February, red tissue paper with chocolate peppers.  Is a distant plan, but this time of the year I have a lot of time for thinking and talking about things like that.

Heathotsauce - Have visited your site and think your back story / setting is fantastic.  If I am thinking right, you are the young couple that opened a brick and mortar hot sauce shop cause you love your product.  Bravo for taping main stream.  Is kind of the direction I am going generally.  Still super hots, but adding other peppers for more main stream folk.  Trinidad sweet comes to mind.  So am wondering if your customer base includes folk just starting to look at artisan sauces.  That is, do you think I could pull off a mainstream thing?
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
I like the idea, here is my two cents for what it is worth:
 
The biggest problem normal people have with superhots is figuring out what to do with them. I've made some super hot powders, with peppers supplied by you  :cool: , that I sent to some family and friends. The overwhelming response I got back was,  "WTF do I do with this stuff?". I think having viable recipes with the peppers each month would go a long way in keeping people coming back for more. Use this July pepper for this included salsa recipe. Then the next month use this pepper for a chili, etc, etc... It gives people a way to use what they are buying. 
 
TW
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
ajdrew said:
Heathotsauce - Have visited your site and think your back story / setting is fantastic.  If I am thinking right, you are the young couple that opened a brick and mortar hot sauce shop cause you love your product.  Bravo for taping main stream.  Is kind of the direction I am going generally.  Still super hots, but adding other peppers for more main stream folk.  Trinidad sweet comes to mind.  So am wondering if your customer base includes folk just starting to look at artisan sauces.  That is, do you think I could pull off a mainstream thing?
Click to expand...
 
Yea, that's us, thanks! I think mainstream is a smart way to go, and I do think you can pull it off, but to do so you might have to make 2 options for your club. One with superhots and one that goes no hotter than habanero. The reason being, my customer base does include a lot of people just starting to get interested in all this stuff, but they tend to be very intimidated by the superhots. You've got to ease them in and start them off with mild stuff first. During harvest season, I had a basket of superhots next to the register and offered to give one free to each customer, and I was surprised that about half the people didn't take them (of course the other half was really excited). I think all the YouTube challenges and things have scared some people off. If I was to market a Pepper of the Month Club to the mainstream, I'd focus on foodies, and feature peppers like Aleppo, Espelette, Aji Amarillo, and like you said, Trinidad Sweet (I grew some Trinidad Perfumes last year and they we're awesome). Recipes would be key, and it'd be cool if you featured recipes based on the region that each pepper is from. 
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Heathotsauce - I think you are right.  I dont think we will be ready to offer a pepper of the month club this year, but with much of the input I am really looking forward to trying it soon.  The suggestion someone provided about recipes for each pepper and my wife talking about up scaling packaging has really got me to thinking about ideas.  I think I am going to think on it for a year and keep a close eye on how the fresh produce meal kit in a box does.

 
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top