Huy Fong Foods is an American

hot sauce Hot sauce is a type of condiment, seasoning, or salsa made from chili peppers and other ingredients. Many commercial varieties of mass-produced hot sauce exist. History Humans have used chili peppers and other hot spices for thousands of ye ...

company based in

Irwindale, California Irwindale is a city in the San Gabriel Valley, in Los Angeles County, California. The population was 1,422 at the 2010 census, down from 1,446 at the 2000 census. The ZIP Codes serving the area are 91010, which is shared with Duarte, 91702, w ...

. It was founded by David Tran, a Vietnamese-born immigrant, beginning in 1980 on Spring Street in

Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, largest city in the U.S. state, state of California and the List of United States cities by population, sec ...

's Chinatown. It has grown to one of the leaders in the

Asian Asian may refer to: * Items from or related to the continent of Asia: ** Asian people, people in or descending from Asia ** Asian culture, the culture of the people from Asia ** Asian cuisine, food based on the style of food of the people from Asi ...

market with its sriracha sauce, popularly referred to as "rooster sauce" or "cock sauce" due to the image of a rooster on the label.

Products

The company's most popular product is its sriracha sauce. The primary ingredients are peppers, garlic, and sugar. It was originally made with

Serrano pepper The serrano pepper ('' Capsicum annuum'') is a type of chili pepper that originated in the mountainous regions of the Mexican states of Puebla and Hidalgo. The name of the pepper is a reference to the mountains ('' sierras'') of these region ...

s and is now made with red Jalapeño peppers, reducing the overall pungency. It is currently Huy Fong Foods' best-known and best-selling item, easily recognized by its bright red color and its packaging: a clear plastic bottle with a green cap, text in five languages (

Vietnamese Vietnamese may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to Vietnam, a country in Southeast Asia ** A citizen of Vietnam. See Demographics of Vietnam. * Vietnamese people, or Kinh people, a Southeast Asian ethnic group native to Vietnam ** Overse ...

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ide ...

Chinese Chinese can refer to: * Something related to China * Chinese people, people of Chinese nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity **''Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic concept of the Chinese nation ** List of ethnic groups in China, people of ...

, French, and

Spanish Spanish might refer to: * Items from or related to Spain: **Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain **Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many Latin American countries **Spanish cuisine Other places * Spanish, Ontario, Can ...

) and the rooster logo. One nickname for the product is "rooster sauce”, for the logo on the bottles.Once Secretive Sriracha Factory Becomes California's Hottest Tourist Attraction
, Forbes, Sep 24, 2014 In contrast to similar hot sauces made by other manufacturers, Huy Fong's sriracha sauce does not contain fish extract, making it suitable for most vegetarians, although the presence of garlic may make it unsuitable for members of

Buddhism Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religions, Indian religion or Indian philosophy#Buddhist philosophy, philosophical tradition based on Pre-sectarian Buddhism, teachings attributed to the Buddha. ...

and some

Hindu Hindus (; ) are people who religiously adhere to Hinduism. Jeffery D. Long (2007), A Vision for Hinduism, IB Tauris, , pages 35–37 Historically, the term has also been used as a geographical, cultural, and later religious identifier for ...

denominations. Huy Fong also makes

sambal oelek Sambal is an Indonesian chilli sauce or paste, typically made from a mixture of a variety of chilli peppers with secondary ingredients, such as shrimp paste, garlic, ginger, shallot, scallion, palm sugar, and lime juice. ''Sambal'' is an I ...

and chili garlic sauces.

History

Founding and early history

Huy Fong Foods was founded by David Tran (born 1945), a

businessman and a former Major in the Army of the Republic of Vietnam. Tran, in a cargo boat, arrived in

Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...

in the spring of 1979 as a part of the migration of the

Vietnamese boat people Vietnamese boat people ( vi, Thuyền nhân Việt Nam), also known simply as boat people, refers to the refugees who fled Vietnam by boat and ship following the end of the Vietnam War in 1975. This migration and humanitarian crisis was at its ...

following the

Vietnam War The Vietnam War (also known by other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vietnam a ...

. Shortly after arriving in Boston, Tran called up his brother-in-law in Los Angeles, and decided to move there after learning that there were red peppers. After arriving in

, Tran established his own hot sauce company which he named after the Huy Fong freighter. The

rooster The chicken (''Gallus gallus domesticus'') is a domesticated junglefowl species, with attributes of wild species such as the grey and the Ceylon junglefowl that are originally from Southeastern Asia. Rooster or cock is a term for an adult m ...

symbol that is a part of the Sriracha branding came from the fact that Tran was born in the Year of the Rooster on the

Chinese zodiac The Chinese zodiac is a traditional classification scheme based on the lunar calendar that assigns an animal and its reputed attributes to each year in a repeating twelve-year cycle. Originating from China, the zodiac and its variations remain ...

. He incorporated Huy Fong Foods, Inc. in February 1980, within a month of arriving in Los Angeles. He had previously made hot sauce with his family while working as a cook in the

South Vietnamese army The Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN; ; french: Armée de la république du Viêt Nam) composed the ground forces of the South Vietnamese military from its inception in 1955 to the Fall of Saigon in April 1975. It is estimated to have suffe ...

. He began selling hot sauces to local Asian restaurants out of a van, making $2,300 in his first month in business. Tran considers Huy Fong Foods to be a

family business A family business is a commercial organization in which decision-making is influenced by multiple generations of a family, related by blood or marriage or adoption, who has both the ability to influence the vision of the business and the willingn ...

. His son William Tran is the company president and daughter Yassie Tran-Holliday is vice president.

Production

In 1987, Huy Fong Foods relocated to a building in

Rosemead, California Rosemead is a city in Los Angeles County, California, United States. As of the 2021 census, it had a population of 50,245, currently dropping. Rosemead is part of a cluster of cities, along with Alhambra, Arcadia, Temple City, Monterey Park ...

that once housed toymaker Wham-O. In 2010, the company opened a factory in

on 23

acres The acre is a unit of land area used in the imperial and US customary systems. It is traditionally defined as the area of one chain by one furlong (66 by 660 feet), which is exactly equal to 10 square chains, of a square mile, 4,840 square ...

, a facility having of office space, of production space, and of warehouse space, which is now the site of manufacture of all three of the brands sauces. These sauces are produced on machinery that has been specially modified by David Tran, who taught himself machining and welding skills. Since 2014, the Irwindale factory has been open to visitors, and has become a tourist attraction. The chili odor that emanated from the Irwindale factory upset the community's residents and the City of Irwindale filed a lawsuit against Huy Fong Foods in October 2013, claiming that the odor was a public nuisance. Initially, a

Los Angeles Superior Court The Superior Court of California, County of Los Angeles, is the California superior court with jurisdiction over Los Angeles County, which includes the city of Los Angeles. It is the largest single unified trial court in the United States. The ...

judge refused the city's bid to shut down the factory but a Los Angeles County Superior Court judge ordered the factory to essentially shut down on November 27, 2013, prohibiting all activities that could cause odors. Irwindale dropped the lawsuit on May 29, 2014, after intervention by the office of Governor

Jerry Brown Edmund Gerald Brown Jr. (born April 7, 1938) is an American lawyer, author, and politician who served as the 34th and 39th governor of California from 1975 to 1983 and 2011 to 2019. A member of the Democratic Party, he was elected Secretary of ...

. In Huy Fong Foods' production at these facilities, the company begins with purchase of chilis grown in Ventura, Los Angeles, and Kern counties and production of a mash from these; most of each year's chili mash is produced in just two months, during the autumn harvest. Earlier, the company used serrano chilis but found them difficult to harvest. The product made from the natural mash is processed such that the final product contains no artificial ingredients. Between 1988 and 2016, Huy Fong Foods had a partnership with Underwood Ranches, which produced red

jalapeño The jalapeño ( , , ) is a medium-sized chili pepper pod type cultivar of the species ''Capsicum annuum''. A mature jalapeño chili is long and hangs down with a round, firm, smooth flesh of wide. It can have a range of pungency, with Scovi ...

s used in sriracha. By 2006, Underwood produced 90% of the peppers used by Huy Fong. Huy Fong Foods' relationship with Underwood and the Ranches ended in 2016 after—as alleged by a lawyer for Underwood—Huy Fong Foods' David Tran "attempted... to hire away Underwood’s COO in order to form a new chile-growing concern", which the lawyer described as breaking trust between the supplier and manufacturer. After a failure by Underwood to return an overpayment in 2016, Huy Fong Foods' sued Underwood Ranches. Underwood then countersued for breach of contract. The countersuit won and Huy Fong Foods was ordered to pay $23.3 million in compensation for damages. The company has never advertised its products, relying instead on

word of mouth Word of mouth, or ''viva voce'', is the passing of information from person to person using oral communication, which could be as simple as telling someone the time of day. Storytelling is a common form of word-of-mouth communication where one pe ...

. Production and sales of the sauces are sizeable; in 2001, the company was estimated to have sold 6,000 tons of chili products, with sales of approximately US$12 million. In 2010 the company produced 20 million bottles of sauce in a year. As of 2012 it had grown to sales of more than US$60 million a year. In 2019, the company had a 10% marketshare of the $1.55 billion hot sauce market in the United States. The company generated over $150 million in revenue as of 2022. The company has warned customers about counterfeit versions of its sauces. In June 2022, Huy Fong Foods announced that they would be pausing production of its popular Sriracha Hot Chili Sauce, due to a “severe shortage” of chili peppers.

Awards and recognition

In December 2009, '' Bon Appétit'' magazine named its Sriracha sauce Ingredient of the Year for 2010.

References

External links

Huy Fong Foods
website. {{Hot sauces Hot sauces Brand name condiments Companies based in Los Angeles County, California Vietnamese cuisine Irwindale, California Rosemead, California Privately held companies based in California 1980 establishments in California Food and drink companies established in 1980 Condiment companies of the United States Food and drink companies based in California Family-owned companies of the United States