The garlic sauce made to his grandfather’s recipe was a hit at Seesen’s Sehusa Festival for many years. Sebastian Heldt has refined the traditional family recipe. He has been on the market with Heldts Saucenmanufaktur since 2020 and achieved remarkable reach with just one product.
Perhaps the down-to-earth attitude of the Seesen founder, who is (still) 40 years old, comes from experiencing the benefits of a family business since childhood. He grew up in the restaurant trade, first run by his grandfather and then his father, and completed his chef training in his parents’ business, the Ratskeller in Seesen. Today, the family also runs a canteen business in Bad Gandersheim.
His family supports the sauce manufactory too, and his brother is due to join next year. ‘It wouldn’t work otherwise,’ Sebastian Heldt stresses. Reflecting on his very careful approach to developing the company, he says: ‘Sometimes shrinking is better than growing.’ Instead of quickly building a broad product range, he focuses exclusively on Sehusa sauce. ‘There are ideas for further products,’ Heldt says. ‘But first I want to see how far this sauce can penetrate the market.’
At present, his main focus is sales. In the early years, he personally approached and supplied privately run supermarkets, regional butcher shops and farms. His sauce is now listed in the central warehouses of REWE Hamburg, Bremen, Schleswig-Holstein and Lower Saxony, and for direct supply to EDEKA Minden and Hessenring and Kaufland. That means around 600 REWE stores in northern Germany can order his product through their central distribution systems. He still delivers to EDEKA and Kaufland himself in a van. ‘The door-to-door selling doesn’t stop, though,’ the founder adds with a laugh. To persuade stores to order Sehusa sauce, Sebastian Heldt spends several days a week on the road promoting his product.
In addition to reliable delivery times and the associated increase in production volume – the goal is a six-figure number of bottles next year – further requirements must be met for warehouse listing. The GLK certification (quality assurance for small food businesses), renewed every 1.5 years, is a welcome quality safeguard for the founder.
He found ideal conditions for production and storage at the former Sonnen Bassermann or Heinz site. The existing infrastructure at Gewerbepark Niedersachsen is designed in part for food production. ‘For me as a founder, these are the best possible conditions,’ Sebastian Heldt stresses. ‘Existing properties surely offer such ideal prospects for other startup ventures too.’ His advice to other founders is: ‘Persistence is the key, even when there are setbacks. And you have to be prepared to make uncomfortable decisions if your own business is to succeed.’
Information: www.heldtssaucenmanufaktur.de
