It's No Secret...Kansas City's Secret Sauce is Back and Bolder Than Ever

In 2009 and 2010, a company known as The Secret Sauce won best barbecue sauce at the American Royal in Kansas City.  And then, we stopped hearing about the sauce.  Bottles of The Secret Sauce started disappearing from grocery store shelves.  As the ingredients for a high quality barbecue sauce continued to rise, the products produced by The Secret Sauce decreased.  A Sauce-a-bition had arisen.  And The Secret Sauce literally became one of Kansas City's best kept secrets.

Until now.

Lucky for Kansas City barbecue lovers everywhere, The Secret Sauce is back...and its bolder than ever before.  The sauce recently launched its first Rock the Post campaign (very similar to Kickstarter).  In the campaign, The Secret Sauce has just 60 days to raise $15,000 for further production of its famous sauce.  The Kansas City sauce startup has already raised $2,500.

"This isn't about building a million-dollar company," said Blake Miller, one of the team members behind The Secret Sauce and partner at Think Big Partners.  "It's a fun project and a great product.  People loved The Secret Sauce.  It's time to bring it back to the hearts and mouths of the Kansas City barbecue community...where it started and where it belongs."

A Secret Sauce-branded Fully charging station.

The Secret Sauce launched its second debut at the American Royal this past weekend.  As one of the most popular stops at the "World Series of BBQ", the sauce startup paired up with Social Smokers, a competitive Midwest barbecue team.  Together, the two hosted a fun Friday night party, American Royal-style (complete with amazing barbecue and of course, killer sauce).

In addition, the spot claimed by Social Smokers and The Secret Sauce also featured a Fully charging station, complete with a Secret Sauce skin (left)!  The Fully charging station allowed for American Royal party-goers and barbecue fanatics to charge their phones during the all-day event for free.  To say it was a hot feature at The Secret Sauce's station is an understatement.

"People loved The Secret Sauce charging station," said Blake Miller.  "It provided great exposure for two Kansas City startups--The Secret Sauce and Fully."

Interested in investing in The Secret Sauce?  You should be!  Check out The Secret Sauce on Rock the Post.  The startup only has until the beginning of December to raise $15,000.  And when you invest, you're in for a saucy surprise.

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Are All Ideas Worth Doing?

As entrepreneurs, this is an emotionally-charged, age old question that startups must face every day. Good ideas often come from the observation of an opportunity, sometimes out of frustration to solve a problem, but always require perspiration to make them work. The hallmark of a good idea is one that can be turned into a profitable business in a reasonable amount of time. But the harsh reality is that unless your solution (idea) is solving a problem that consumers are willing to pay for at a reasonable price for a reasonable amount of time, then your good idea may be destined to be not worth doing.

Capital markets are also fairly straightforward. Businesses that are profitable, sustainable and replicable will usually attract investment. But one factor that many people fail to identify in the normal business planning process is the cost of capital and projected return on investment and the risk associated with it. If an idea requires a million dollars to start and is projected to return only 100k, then does that make it a bad idea? It depends. Is the return in 30 days, or 3 years? If it is 30 days, then sign me up. If it means 3 years...the internal rate of return for most financial investors may be less than ideal. And by the way, what is the risk to achieving this return?

Here are a few other considerations. What about the financial barriers to entry for your idea’s marketplace? If the required capital is low enough, you may have many competitors entering your space once your idea gains traction, only to compete with you on pricing or some other front unrelated to idea quality. Especially if you are first to a new market, the bleeding edge ideas often require considerable money to educate the consumer regarding your product or service—even before they are willing to buy due to lack of understanding. If the barrier to entry is enormously high (as an example; life sciences or biotechnology plays), then the risk adjusted return may be higher than desired for some investors to stomach.

Business plans also often neglect to look at details beyond dimensions of the core solution related to the core problem. A great example of unbridled ideation meeting innovation is the Netflix innovation contest. If you are not familiar with this story, it is worth examining. The takeaway from this story is that solutions can come from a wide variety of areas for problems, which can then create a wider set of problems that can be fixed with the same solutions. The “addressable” market for a single idea becomes bigger when you think beyond the traditional scope of a single problem/solution relationship when designing your next big idea. And this means a better return on investment.  In the end, it is all about the discipline of identifying good ideas, determining if there is a financial market, the risk to achieving that return and then executing.

Turning idea risk into execution risk is never as easy as an entrepreneur would like, but if you can combine a typical business planning process with an appreciation for some of these considerations, it will help you spend more time on the good ideas that are actually worth doing.

There are a lot of good business ideas in today's world but not every idea is worth pursuing.  Those interested in learning exactly what it take to turn a good idea into a profitable business should attend Think Big Partners' Entrepreneur Bootcamp.  I will be presenting the first bootcamp session next Tuesday, October 11th.  In this session, I will identify how new businesses and startups can succeed in today's hyper-competitve global marketplace.  Enterpreneur Bootcamp will take place from 3:00-6:00pm at bizperc in the Kansas City Crossroads.  Register here today!  

Written by Herb Sih, managing partner of Think Big Parnters

@thinkbigKC