вЂњBefore we might have made a pallet of mash a day. He estimates they processed more than 200,000 pounds of peppers. The increase in business, a record harvest in 2019 and a planned expansion into more acreage all add up to the company being on track to have its largest year of production вЂњby far,вЂќ according to Brett Rogers, chief of operations and a longtime friend of Currie. The storefront, combined with a lucrative online business, earned the company more than $2 million in 2018 вЂњwithout even trying,вЂќ Currie says. Largely a business-to-business operation, Currie also maintains a store on Main Street in downtown Fort Mill. Today, heвЂ™s supplying many of the worldвЂ™s hot sauce companies with the raw material to add heat to their products. After earning the Guinness World Record for hottest pepper seven years ago and holding the record ever since, Currie began building his empire by selling products at local farmersвЂ™ markets. Sauce is just one facet of PuckerButt Pepper Company. вЂњYou donвЂ™t think it needs some Reaper?вЂќ he asks. Several second-guess the composition of the holiday hot sauce Currie isnвЂ™t quite satisfied with it either. The men and women who work here have largely become immune to the effects of the fiery air, and what they consider hot is much different from the average consumerвЂ™s perception. For the uninitiated, itвЂ™s like breathing magma, particularly in the kitchen where sauces and вЂњpepper mashвЂќ are prepared.

The air in the production building is saturated with the aroma of cooking peppers. I taste a lot of apple,вЂќ he says, savoring the blend.

ItвЂ™s a milder sauce, and actually doesnвЂ™t contain any of the famous Reaper, but instead, one of the many other varieties of peppers Currie grows on more than 42 acres of land he oversees in the area. Today heвЂ™s developing a batch of special holiday sauce, and employees periodically approach him with plastic sample spoons containing a warm, orange liquid for him to taste. Still, an aura surrounds him, a Yoda-like wisdom of the ways of capsaicin, the compound that gives peppers their heat. Shipments go in and out sauce bottles need to be filled, sealed and labeled payroll is due today and a swarm of ladybugs is scheduled to be released into the greenhouse to organically deal with an aphid infestation.Д¬urrie looks comfortable, if not slightly disheveled, with an unkempt beard, ball cap, baggy hoodie and jeans. He quietly oversees the confusion of activity swirling around him. While they arenвЂ™t up hours before dawn picking peppers, work remains: making hot sauce, packing, shipping and preparing for next season.Д¬ompany founder вЂњSmokinвЂ™вЂќ Ed Currie, creator of the menacing Carolina Reaper-officially the hottest pepper on the planet-sits on a wheeled office chair surrounded by stacked boxes filled with hot sauces. An insufferably hot summer resulted in a later harvest, which just ended earlier in the month.

ItвЂ™s mid-November 2019, and employees of PuckerButt Pepper Company in downtown Fort Mill are finally enjoying a moment of downtime.

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