Justin Gill was desperate. In his years-long quest to mass-produce and distribute his grandmother’s homemade Japanese barbecue sauce without filling it with preservatives, he borrowed $250,000 from family and friends, maxed out his credit cards, and turned his Northern California home into a distribution center. But he needed more capital in the months following the brand’s launch in 2019. So the landscaper and father of three turned to short-term, high-interest loans, where the debt was accruing daily.
“Every dollar I could find or borrow, I invested in Facebook ads,” says Gill, who prayed that the traffic would convert into sales. Before one of his creditors foreclosed on his house, he prayed that the traffic would translate into sales of the nearly $10-a-bottle special sauce, which he called Bachan’s, named after the Japanese word for grandmother.
His desperation was short-lived. Sales of this sweet-salty condiment with umami flavor skyrocketed, jumping from $35,000 in its first year to $1.5 million in 2020, thanks to Gill’s push, the brand’s healthy shine, and largely the onset of the pandemic, which radically changed how American households ate. Now, revenues are on track to exceed $100 million by 2025, according to someone close to the company. A spokesperson for Bachan’s declined to provide details on profitability, revenue, and other financial data.
Bachan’s ships tens of millions of bottles each year to over 25,000 retail locations across the country, including Costco, Walmart, and Whole Foods. The company claims its products are present in about 5% of U.S. households alongside ketchup, mustard, and other American staples. “Right now we’re where we want to be,” says Gill, 43. Still, “we’d love to be in 80%.”
The squeezable red-topped bottle has found its way into the fridges of some major brands. In a TikTok video, TV personality Bethenny Frankel tells her 2.8 million followers that it is “probably the best Asian sauce I’ve ever tasted,” as she dips her sushi rolls in a container of Bachan’s hot and spicy flavor.
Model-turned-entrepreneur, Hailey Bieber, who has 2.5 million subscribers on YouTube, douses her fried wings with the original variety in a cooking video. “I put it on salmon, chicken, anything you can think of,” she says while mixing her sauce, which is basically Bachan’s with cayenne, honey, and a splash of Sriracha. “I love this sauce.”
Gill grew up eating his grandmother’s barbecue sauce spread over fried rice, beef sukiyaki, and chicken tenders. Its commercial potential became clear to him at an early age when customers of his father’s landscaping business who were given bottles of the secret family recipe came back asking for refills. When he decided to turn that idea into a real product, Gill knew he had to manufacture it at scale without compromising quality.
He stuck to his grandmother’s list of 10 ingredients—including a mirin that the same Japanese family has been making for seven generations—and developed a cold-filling process that extends the product’s shelf life without pasteurizing it. Unlike more traditional barbecue sauces, which typically get their sweet, spicy, or smoky flavor from a combination of brown sugar or corn syrup, vinegar, salt and pepper, and tomato paste, Bachan’s flavor profile resembles American teriyaki, bursting with soy sauce, ginger, garlic, and green onions.
“People are tired of the same old brands,” says Alex Hayes, co-founder of Harris & Hayes, a food consulting firm, referring to the growing popularity of condiments like Bachan’s. “They are looking for excitement and novelty.”
The main catalyst for the brand’s almost overnight success was undoubtedly the pandemic. When consumers were forced to cook at home, they began seeking new ideas on social media.
By the end of 2020, Bachan’s was the best-selling barbecue sauce on Amazon.com. Keefer estimates that the company secured more retail accounts in one year than a typical food product does in five years.
The sauce also gained popularity as Japanese flavors and ingredients like miso, yuzu, and matcha have gained traction, seemingly omnipresent on modern American menus.
Health-conscious consumers looking for alternatives to ultra-processed foods have also contributed to sales.
The company pushed retailers to stock Bachan’s in the barbecue aisle instead of the international section, helping position it in the barbecue sauce category.
The explosive growth attracted investors’ attention. In 2021, after a partner discovered the condiment on Amazon, Prelude Growth Partners offered to invest $10 million in Bachan’s. Gill rejected them. “I didn’t want to reveal too much about the business,” he says. Prelude called back and proposed $4 million; this time, he accepted. “I’ll never forget that $4 million,” Gill says, adding that until then, he wasn’t even taking a salary. The company became profitable the following year. Shortly after that, Sonoma Brands Capital led a $13 million funding round. Still, Gill maintains a majority stake.
The cash injection allowed Bachan’s to ramp up production at its third-party Bay Area plant and expand its Japanese-inspired flavors: sweet honey, miso and garlic, and roasted garlic, to name a few. The company has also launched dipping sauces.
Gill dreams of a national restaurant chain, perhaps Wingstop or Buffalo Wild Wings, though there have not been any discussions yet.
By the end of 2020, McCormick & Co. acquired the Cholula hot sauce brand from private equity firm L Catterton for $800 million in cash; last year, Campbell’s Co. bought Sovos Brands Inc., maker of Rao’s pasta sauce, in a deal valued at $2.7 billion. In October, PepsiCo Inc. announced the acquisition of Siete Foods, a salsas and sauces brand, along with gluten-free tortillas, for $1.2 billion.
Gill says he has no plans to sell in the short term. “We get a lot of interest from private equity firms and large conglomerates wanting to buy the business,” he says. “But at some point, we will need help, and I think that’s when I would be more open to bringing in a strategic partner.”
As for Gill’s grandmother, Judy Yokoyama, she is not involved in the business but remains active and occasionally still steals the show. Each year, when Gill celebrates Bachan Day in Sebastopol, his hometown, fans line up to meet, greet, and snap a selfie with the 89-year-old grandmother whose secret recipe started it all.