OUR HISTORY

I grew up in Upstate NY. A surprise, I'm sure! Rochester to be precise. In 1980, one of my high school friends and I began to become regulars at a little bar & grill called Hitchcock’s on the east side of the city. They had buffalo wing specials on Monday and Wednesday evenings. We would go and sit and discuss the issues of our youth and the order of the day over an order of wings. We would wait in anticipation until they brought the wings out and then with our mouths watering, we would slowly sink our teeth into this culinary delight. No sooner had we eaten a wing when we would both verbally begin the rating process. Crispness, taste, size, non-greasiness! Ahhh, Heaven!

Upon going to college at the University of Buffalo, I quickly began to scout out the best wing places there as well. When low on gas funds or without a vehicle, my friends and I would often brave a twenty-minute walk in sub-freezing temperatures and a couple feet of snow to walk to our favorite wing eatery, Rootie's Pump Room, the best in Buffalo at the time, to be warmed by the culinary heat of an order of Buffalo wings. Ahhh!

Ever since then wings quickly became my favorite food. While I lived in Rochester I consumed wings on average 10 meals a week; at different places of course. They were 75% of my diet back then and to the dismay of many. I quickly began to know where the best wings could be found in Rochester as well as in Buffalo where I still spent a significant amount of time over the years. A rating system used to hang on my refrigerator rating the varying wings around the region in the most important categories: Taste of course, heat/flavor balance, wing size (not too big, not too small), whether they’re cooked crispy enough, enough sauce, etc. Today, I still keep tabs nationwide.

I subsequently spent two years in the U.S. Army in Europe, followed by my last two years of undergraduate school, and then graduate school, all out of the Rochester/Buffalo area. Unfortunately, at that time wings had not yet risen in popularity much beyond the Western New York region of Buffalo/Rochester.

I found it difficult to find wings and difficult if not impossible to find good wings at local establishments and few restaurants and bars were open to my giving them a good sauce recipe to have and use. It was at this point that I began to make my own. I started making my own buffalo wing sauce in 1990. It developed slowly and I made changes as revelations would hit me, often after tasting something unique in an order of wings that I had eaten somewhere.

It was only once I moved to Northern Virginia that I realized how good my sauce was based on feedback received by everyone that tried them. It was virtually impossible for me to find wings there that were very good by Upstate NY standards. They are still not as available as they are in Upstate NY, but decent wings can be found although few superlative wing places exist around the nation in spite of the number of chains known for their wings, even today.

Since 1993 I had people tell me that I should market my sauce. I had gone into local establishments offering them my sauce recipes for free. Several restaurants refused my gracious offer without ever having even tasted it. My friends and I would have been satisfied to merely be able to have had a place to go for wings, beer, and some camaraderie. Oh well. Those silly geese!

Anyway, as a result, here we are. Now the best wing sauce on the market is available in the foodservice industry as well as retail for consumers. Don’t believe that it’s the best out there? Try it and compare them to your favorite. Don't be surprised where you might see Wy's Wings popping up in the future although many restaurants that we serve do not broadcast the fact that they use Wy’s Wing Sauces lest their competition find out. In the meantime, we hope you truly enjoy Wy's Wing Sauces as much as others that eat them do.

Enjoy! Thank my friends for encouraging me to put it on the market!

ABOUT the LINE

The Wy's Original brand was spun off of from the Wy's Wings brand.  Wy's Wings sauces originated with a line of Buffalo Wing Sauces, meaning sauces with a cayenne pepper sauce base, and then expanded into other more versatile sauces.  The Wy's Wings brand with "Wings" as the prominent word in the logo and labels, and with a chicken as the primary portion of the logo, pigeon-holed that line such that our other far more versatile sauces, such as our Sweet & Tangy sauces, our Teriyaki, and our Sweet Thai Chili Garlic sauces, all superlative and among the best in the market in their own right, were viewed as exclusively wing sauces rather than the far more universal sauces that they are. 

Wy's Wings sauces, despite their awards and status as best wing sauces in the industry, have primarily been distributed via foodservice with only local, regional, and online distribution in the retail market.  

Upon the creation of SAUCE IT ALL, it quickly became apparent that this sauce had the ability to outperform the others at the retail level, partially due to its exceptional and unique taste, and partially due to a rebranding taking the "wings" association out of the marketing aspect of it to market it as the far more universal all-purpose sauce that it is.  Several of our sauces in the original line will be migrated over to the Wy's Original All-Natural line once SAUCE IT ALL becomes established.  

Recently added to our Wy's Original line is our Burger & Steak Sauce.  While we did not think that a sauce with more RAVE reviews than SAUCE IT ALL was possible, we are astonished to find out that the early returns are that our Burger & Steak Sauce is outselling the SAUCE IT ALL, which typically outsold all the others combined at a 2-to-1 margin or so.  To say that we are pleased with this development is to understated.  

As well, new sauces will also be added.  Some to look forward to seeing under the Wy's Original brand/label are our Teriyaki, X-Hot Buffalo Wing sauce, a Peruvian Pollo sauce, and Jerk sauce.  As with our Wy's Wings line, we will not release a sauce and add it to our line unless via extensive testing we determine that it is a superlative product and among the best if not the best outright on the market. 

The original line of Wy's Wings sauces is now being offered for private-label premium lines. 

WY'S HISTORY

Wy’s Wings was founded by its owner whose favorite food has been Buffalo Wings since 1980. Buffalo wings have been a staple in his dietary regimen ever since. In 1990 he began to make his own sauce which he was strongly encouraged to put on the market by just about everyone to whom he served it to. The recipe evolved and was finished for large scale production in early 2001 and actually improved in taste and flavor over stove top cooking when it went to mass production.

Wy’s sauces incorporate a smattering of the ingredients that have made the best Buffalo Wing places in Buffalo and Upstate New York what they are today.  Wy’s own blend of secret spices and seasonings was then added to distinguish this sauce as the best wing sauce that will ever grace your taste buds. Wy’s hotter sauces not only provide heat but incredible flavor and taste as well.  Those that sample them quickly identify them as sauces with perfect heat/flavor balance as they run from Mild to “Wy’s Guy.” Wy’s milder sauces have an incredible flavor that will not be matched by any other milder wing sauces.

Wy’s Wings wing sauces are a line of wing sauces that stand alone at the top second to none in the industry! They are all fully prepared sauces that you could not create any less expensively in your shop. They use the finest in ingredients and the end product makes that obvious.

We have had customers tell us about other uses for our sauces ranging from simple marinades for round steak to condiments to Bloody Mary mix. While we encourage that and are excited to hear about that, the sauces have been formulated first and foremost to be the proper consistency for application to hot, cooked wings, and to have optimal flavor profile and heat/flavor balance.  We continually receive incredible recognition from numerous sources that we have in fact accomplished that in spades. They are a key value-adding ingredient to wings and a wing program. Remember, most consumers purchase wings for the flavor/sauce! 

The pride & joy of our line of sauces is the original lineup of Buffalo Wing Sauces that kicked our business off. They have won numerous major national level awards over the years including besting Western New York’s (Buffalo & Rochester) best wing places in the summer of ’07 in a taste challenge for a film documentary on Buffalo Wings, and having been judged Best Restaurant Wings in the state of Delaware in the summer or 2012 in a Mountaire Chicken sponsored restaurant competition.

They continue to help restaurants increase their wings sales and net profits by giving them a competitive advantage in marketplace where the competition for the consumer food dollar is growing ever stronger.  With Wy’s Sauces you can make wings that stand head and shoulders above the rest and certainly above what any chain that offers wings as their signature item. We know that you have your customers, isn’t it time to begin drawing the customers of your competition?!

Our sauces are available in both foodservice as well as in retail sizes, we will private label, and we serve anyone form individual consumers desirous of making the best wings in the nation right from their own kitchen, to Ma & Pop standalones, to large chains. Our sauces have been proven to very significantly increase wing sales and thereby also indirect sales including bar sales as a result.

So if you are interested in increasing your sales & profits, please let us know!