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Little Lou’s Barbecue

Lance Wagner of Little Lou’s in Los Gatos now sells his barbecue sauce in local stores and at San Jose Giants games

by Stett Holbrook on Jul 29, 2010
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THERE IS more than barbecued ribs and chicken cooking at Little Lou’s Barbecue in Los Gatos. Sales of the restaurant’s barbecue sauce are smoking.

Little Lou’s owner, Lance Wagner, had been selling his regular and spicy barbecue sauce out of the restaurant for years. Encouraged by friends and customers, he decided to try to put his stuff on the shelves of local stores. He had a label designed featuring a happy chef manning a flaming grill and went through all the legal and bureaucratic hoops to get his product to market. Now the sauce is for sale at Lunardi’s, Cosentino’s, the Summit Store in Los Gatos, several local Ace Hardware stores and various locations in Santa Cruz County. Costco is going to carry the sauce next month and Safeway is interested as well. Not bad after just four months.

“I don’t want to say it’s been easy, but it’s gone really well,” says Wagner. “It’s pretty cool to go into a store and see your stuff on the shelf.”

The sauce sells for $4.99 at most stores. I’m a fan of the spicy sauce. It’s got a good balance of sweetness and vinegar with a healthy dose of cayenne and chile-flake heat. It’s spicy for sure, but the heat doesn’t crowd out the other flavors. Wagner created the recipe for the sauce, but now it’s made and bottled in a commercial facility in Healdsburg. The kitchen has been making Little Lou’s sauce for years and can handle as much volume as Wagner can send its way.

The sauce has also become the official barbecue sauce for the San Jose Giants. Wagner met some representatives of the minor league ball club at an auction and asked them if they’d be willing to give his sauce a try. They had been serving Cattlemen’s sauce but said it had to be “doctored up” to their liking. The Giants reps liked the sauce, and now it’s served on all the barbecued and grilled meat at Turkey Mike’s, the barbecue restaurant located along the third-base line at San Jose’s Municipal Stadium.

Business continues to cook for Little Lou’s. Wagner says he’s planning to open another location in Campbell by the end of the year.

Little Lou’s Barbecue
15466 Los Gatos Blvd., Los Gatos



by Stett Holbrook on Jul 29, 2010
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