Roger Damptz, owner of Burn Your Tongue Hot Sauces, is on a mission to expose Utahns to a new level of heat.
Burn Your Tongue’s spicy sampling tables let people try over 50 different hot sauces.
“Basically, this is just a chance to let people experience new flavors from all over the country: local Utah product, Oregon, Florida — just a lot of variety,” Damptz said.
Damptz has been in the hot sauce industry for over 15 years. He has built a community with fellow spice lovers, he said.
“We probably come here at least twice a month to restock on all of the hot sauces and everything that we like," Vanessa Ewell, a Burn Your Tongue Hot Sauces customer, said.
Ewell and her husband are loyal customers who met Damptz at a spicy sampling table event.
“We saw that and he had to just start tasting them," Ewell said of her husband. "We were here for like an hour, just tasting and talking about all the hot sauces and everything. And then (we've) just been coming back."
Damptz has had booths at the Orem Locals store for over 3 years. The booth features over 340 hot sauces; his largest booths have more than 800.
When he was planning on closing his booth in Orem, customers reached out, Damptz said.
“I was getting ready to pull out. I had customers rally and not only tell me, but tell the store that they didn't want me to leave,” he said.
Damptz has seen an increase in community support since then, which has given him peace in his decision, he said.
“I'm more than happy to stay and put in the extra effort as long as people appreciate it and are willing to come by and shop,” Damptz said.
Damptz has started working on his new hot sauce brand, Spice Curious, which is aimed at helping Utahns explore their heat threshold.