00:00Every year, Frank's Red Hot churns out more than 20 million gallons of hot sauce at this factory.
00:09The raw pepper mash arrives in rail cars, from New Mexico to Missouri,
00:16before getting mixed and agitated in 5,000-gallon tanks.
00:21The smell is strong but sweet. You'll definitely feel it in your sinus.
00:25Competition in the industry is heating up with hundreds of small craft sauce makers cooking up creative flavors.
00:34The changing demographics have had an effect also on heat acceptance across
00:39because the cultures are starting to interconnect.
00:43But Frank's, which has been around for more than a century, is still America's number one hot sauce brand.
00:50So what's the secret behind this iconic American condiment?
00:54And how has it managed to stand out in the hot sauce market?
01:04Frank's Red Hot is manufactured in this 50-acre factory in Springfield, Missouri.
01:09Cayenne peppers that are already mashed up into a paste arrive here in 20,000-gallon rail cars.
01:16We always have pepper mash ready to be making Frank's Red Hot all day, every day.
01:21That's John Martens. He works at the spice giant McCormick, Frank's parent company.
01:27It bought the hot sauce brand in 2017 as part of a larger acquisition worth $4.2 billion.
01:36We're checking these seals down here just to make sure that no one has touched that rail car.
01:41John's team has to measure the spice and viscosity of each batch so they can get the ratios just right for Frank's Red Hot.
01:49Then they attach a tube that carries the mash to one of these 5,000-gallon tanks.
01:55So we're in our tank farm right now.
01:58All 15 in here are full.
02:00So this is what the pepper mash looks like before we convert it into Frank's Red Hot upstairs.
02:05So what we want to do here, we're going to turn the agitator on just to get it moving as well.
02:10You can tell it really has a strong smell.
02:13This one might have a little more punch, so they dilute it with a milder batch.
02:20They mix them together in what they call the blend tank.
02:24Frank's biggest secret is in how it mills its peppers.
02:28We have a unique process in the way that we make Frank's Red Hot, which is part of what maintains the flavor of the pepper.
02:34Milling is what gets the sauce to go from this pulpy mash to this.
02:39Then, workers perform what they call the slick test.
02:45This is what we do every hour.
02:48We perform visual checks to make sure there are no particles too big or too small in our sample.
02:55So we have good products ready to be bottled.
02:58This is how it looks good.
03:00So now that we've made our Frank's Red Hot sauce, what we're doing next is sending it to our bulk tanks for storage.
03:08On an average day, the company makes about 130,000 gallons worth of Frank's Red Hot.
03:15Here is one of our large tanks for storage.
03:20We'll turn through these tanks over 10 times a day.
03:23If you want to come up here and take a look.
03:25I wish you were here because this is a big deal.
03:29I wish you were here because this smells amazing if you could taste it through your nose.
03:34If that doesn't wake you up, I don't know what will.
03:39From here, the sauce travels through a network of pipes into a different room where it gets turned into one of Frank's 155 products,
03:49like its buffalo sauce or chicken dip.
03:52The company has 12 packaging lines.
03:55We make hot sauce into everything from 12 ounce bottles that you see in your refrigerator,
04:01gallon bottles that you see at the restaurant, or 300 gallon totes, or all the way up to 45,000 pound tankers.
04:08They can all be sent simultaneously through this maze of piping behind me.
04:12And to keep it moving, each of these machines has to run at a precise pace.
04:25This capper can close 100 bottles in just one minute.
04:29As we come further down the line, we're going to pass through an x-ray unit.
04:34We're going to make sure we're only sending out quality product all day, every day.
04:39The facility pumps out about 20 million gallons of Frank's Red Hot every year.
04:44It ships these all over the U.S. and to 48 other countries.
04:49Frank's journey to becoming the most popular hot sauce in America began more than a century ago.
04:56In 1918, a man named Jacob Frank was running his own spice company in Cincinnati.
05:05He wanted to make a sauce like Tabasco's founder did, but with a different kind of pepper, cayenne.
05:13He got his first batch from a farmer in Louisiana.
05:16And together, they started processing it into hot sauce.
05:20It was somewhat similar to Tabasco in its high vinegar-to-pepper ratio.
05:25But Frank had his own secret in the way he milled his peppers to help them retain their flavor.
05:32By 1900, he'd perfected his recipe and launched Frank's Red Hot.
05:38Since McCormick bought the company eight years ago, it's more than doubled its international sales.
05:46At this test kitchen in Maryland, Hadar Cohen creates new recipes for Frank's that you can find on its website or the back of the bottle.
05:59Today, she's making buffalo wings and cauliflower bites.
06:03To make the sauce I'm going to use Frank's, the original sauce, it's just, it has all of those really nice buffalo flavors that we're expecting.
06:12Getting this really nice orangey hue, almost.
06:17Hot sauce is a really, really great shortcut in many cases to build that flavor in the dish itself.
06:25She says many Americans prefer Frank's because it's not too spicy.
06:32People want different ways in and maybe, you know, they don't have that high tolerance, but they do want to enjoy that tang, that little bit of heat.
06:41Delicious.
06:42Another way Frank's is competing with craft makers is by introducing new flavors, like hot honey and dill pickle hot sauce.
06:53In 2024, Frank's also introduced a dollar minis.
06:57To ensure that we overcome that risk barrier.
07:00Hey, will I like it? Will I not like it? Should I use my money on that or not?
07:04Another reason why hot sauce has become more popular recently is changing demographics.
07:11In the 1990s, America was becoming more diverse.
07:17A wave of immigration introduced spicy dishes from all over the world.
07:23And heat slowly started becoming more popular.
07:28I grew up in Mexico.
07:30My boyfriend is American, but he eats a lot more heat now because I bring that to the mix.
07:35In recent years, hot sauce has become one of the most popular condiments in America.
07:40Between 2019 and 2021, sales shot up almost 22%.
07:47The global hot sauce industry in 2024 was valued at about $3.3 billion.
07:53And that's supposed to double by 2032.
07:56In the U.S. alone, the industry is worth about $1.1 billion.
08:01With 90% of Americans saying they eat hot sauce.
08:06Gen Z and millennials as well, they're generations that are very open to flavor and to heat.
08:14They want to experiment. They love trying new things.
08:17And their heat profile keeps growing over time.
08:22So, Frank's launched a number of campaigns tapping into Gen Z trends.
08:27Frank's Red Heart. I put that sh** on everything.
08:31Even on pizza?
08:32Add nachos and wings.
08:34The company teamed up with Fortnite in 2023 to release a game mode called The Floor is Flava.
08:41A custom-immersive Fortnite island where we turn lava into flava.
08:46A year later, Frank's launched what it called an edible NFT and spoof cryptocurrency Bonecoin to celebrate buffalo wings before the Super Bowl.
08:56In fact, the Super Bowl is its biggest week as Americans load up on chicken wings lathered with Frank's.
09:03Wings on three!
09:06In the U.S. in 2024, people consumed 1.4 billion chicken wings the day of the Super Bowl.
09:15And Frank's hot sauce sales are 25% of the entire hot sauce sales in the U.S. during that time.
09:24We try to ensure the brand is present in moments that matter.
09:28We don't have to push ourselves into a Super Bowl. We're already part of it.
09:36While trends come and go, the people who make the hot sauce say its success lies in its simplicity.
09:43Take a look at that ingredient statement. There's only a couple flavors that are on there.
09:47If you see what the first one is on there, it's cayenne pepper.
09:50It's a very clean hot sauce and we're looking forward to make it for a very long time.
09:58To be continued...
10:05To be continued...
10:08To be continued...
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