One-to-One Guidance From Someone Who’s Actually Done It
I’ve taken a hot sauce business from twenty bottles at a time to thousands in a day. Book a session and we’ll work out your next move, whether you’re bottling your first batch, scaling up production, or pushing your growing further.
Running paid sessions since 2022 with growers, cooks and business owners across the UK, Europe, North America, the Middle East, Africa and Asia. Some are bottling their first batch. Others are established brands working on a new line, a bigger run, or their first export order.
Who You’re Talking To
I’m Shaun, the person behind ChilliChump. I’ve been growing chillies commercially since 2006, and I’ve built my hot sauce production from small runs on a kitchen hob to thousands of bottles in a day. Alongside that I’ve grown a YouTube channel past 200,000 subscribers organically, with nothing spent on advertising, and I run seed, sauce and spice businesses across several sites.
I’ve done every part of it myself. Recipe development, food safety documentation and HACCP, labelling, choosing and commissioning equipment, scaling production, e-commerce, and building an audience from nothing. Twenty years in IT sits underneath all of it, which is why I’ve built my own IoT monitoring and plant tracking software (SpicyIoT and SeedsIO) to run the growing side.
None of what I tell you is theory. You get the answer that worked for me, including the parts that went wrong first.
Is This For You?
This is for people who are past the browsing stage. You’ve watched the videos, you’ve done the reading, and now you have questions that are specific to your situation. Maybe you’re ready to turn a hobby into a business and don’t know the practical steps. Maybe you’re already selling and hitting a ceiling. Maybe you want to build an audience around what you do and you’re getting no traction.
If you want direct answers from someone who has been through it, a session will save you months of trial and error.
It’s probably not for you if you’re looking for someone to run the business for you, or if what you need is a general answer to a general question. There’s a lot of that on my channel already, free.
What Can I Help With?
Start a Hot Sauce Business
You’ve got a recipe people keep asking you for. Between food safety rules, production logistics, labelling requirements and finding your first stockists, the gap between kitchen batches and product on a shelf can look enormous. I’ve crossed that gap. We’ll go through your food safety documentation and HACCP, the right equipment for the volume you’re actually doing, recipes that survive being scaled up, labels that are compliant and still get picked off a shelf, and where your first routes to market are.
Scale Up, or Sell Further Afield
Plenty of the people I work with are already selling and have run into a ceiling. Bigger batches take longer than they should, margins are thinner than they look on paper, a new product line keeps stalling, or a first export order has raised questions nobody warned them about. We can look at where your production hours are going and what to automate first, how to cost a product so it still works at a wholesale price, how to keep a recipe consistent across bigger runs and longer shelf lives, and what UK and EU import and packaging rules mean for you. I deal with those rules in my own business, so you get the practical version rather than the summary.
Grow Better Chillies, At Any Scale
Whether you’re killing your third batch of seedlings or you’re running a polytunnel and want to push yields further, I can help. I’ve been growing commercially in the UK climate since 2006, using everything from basic pots to full hydroponic setups with automated irrigation, climate control and sensor monitoring. Soil against hydro, optimising your greenhouse environment, diagnosing a problem you can’t place, or getting your seedlings through their first few weeks alive: this is the session for that.
Automate Your Growing
I built two platforms off the back of my own growing needs. SpicyIoT handles environment monitoring: Arduino, ESP32 and Raspberry Pi sensors tracking temperature, humidity, soil moisture and light levels across my growing spaces, with automated irrigation and ventilation. SeedsIO is my plant tracking app for logging varieties, germination rates, grow notes and harvest data across seasons. If you want to bring tech into your greenhouse or grow room, from a single sensor to full automation, I can walk you through the hardware, the wiring and the software.
Build an Audience Around What You Do
I grew the ChilliChump channel from zero to more than 200,000 subscribers without spending anything on advertising, and turned it into a business that sells seeds, sauces and sponsorships. I know what works on the platform and what doesn’t, because I’ve published through both. If you’re starting a niche channel, stuck on an existing one, or trying to turn content into income, we can go through content strategy, production quality, what your analytics are actually telling you, and how to monetise it.
Not everyone needs a business plan. If you want to talk chillies, get variety recommendations for the coming season, or buy a session as a gift for the chilli obsessive in your life, a Quick Fire session covers it.
How It Works
1. Book a Time
Pick a slot that suits you from the calendar below. Payment is taken at the time of booking, and sessions run over Google Meet.
2. Send Me Your Questions
Beforehand, send over what you want to get out of it: your questions, and photos, labels or recipes if they’re relevant. The more I have going in, the further we get in the time.
3. We Meet
A focused session on your situation. I’ll share my screen, pull up real examples from my own setup, and give you direct answers.
4. You Leave With a Plan
You get the recording afterwards, and with a Strategy Session, a written summary with your next steps in order and the reasoning behind each one. Email follow-up for the week after is included.
Sessions are confidential. I won’t share your business details, ideas or recipes with anyone, and I ask the same of you regarding the advice and strategies I share.
Session Options
Quick Fire
30 Minutes: £80
You have one specific question, or a short list of them, and you want a direct answer from someone who has already solved it.
Good for: an equipment recommendation, troubleshooting a recipe, a label compliance check, a thumbnail review, or a “should I do X or Y” decision.
Most Popular
Strategy Session
60 Minutes: £150
You need a plan. We’ll go through where you are, work out what’s holding you up, and set out your next steps in the order to do them.
Good for: starting a sauce business, planning a growing season, scaling production, building a content strategy, or a decision that’s been sitting on your desk for weeks. Includes the recording, a written summary and a week of email follow-up.
Project Work
Priced on scope
Some businesses need more than an hour. Product and recipe development, a production setup built from nothing, or someone alongside you for a few months while it comes together.
We start with a Strategy Session so I understand what you’re building. After that I’ll quote a fixed fee against agreed deliverables, or a monthly retainer if you want me available over a longer stretch.
Who I Work With
First-time makers with a recipe and no idea what comes next. Restaurant owners who want to bottle the house sauce and sell it. Growers going commercial. Established hot sauce brands working on their next line or their first export order. Teams building something from scratch in a market that has no local brand at all.
The part I’m most pleased about is that people come back. Several have booked repeatedly over two or three years as their businesses have grown, which tells me more than any single session does.
Common Questions
How long is a session?
Thirty or sixty minutes, depending on which option you book. Sessions start on time, so check that Google Meet works in your browser before we begin.
Do you work with people outside the UK?
Most of my clients are outside the UK. I’ve run sessions across Europe, North America, the Middle East, Africa and Asia, and the calendar shows slots in your local time. Tell me where you’re producing when you book and I’ll read up on the requirements in your market beforehand, so we spend the session on your business rather than on me catching up.
Do I get a recording?
Yes. I record on my end and send you the file afterwards, so you can concentrate on the conversation rather than on taking notes.
Is everything we discuss kept confidential?
Yes. I won’t share your business details, ideas, recipes or anything else from our session with anyone. I ask for the same in return: the specific advice, strategies and insights I share are for your own use, and shouldn’t be redistributed, published or shared publicly. By booking a session, you agree to these terms.
What if I need more help after the session?
Email follow-up for quick clarifications in the week after your session is included at no extra cost. Beyond that you can book another session whenever it suits, and if the work turns into something ongoing, we’d set it up as project work or a monthly retainer rather than a string of one-off bookings.
I’m a complete beginner. Is this too advanced for me?
No. I pitch every session at wherever you are. Starting from scratch, we’ll cover the foundations. Already running a business, we’ll go deeper.
Can I ask a quick question instead of booking?
General questions are usually answered somewhere in my articles or on the channel, and that’s free. A paid session is for the questions that only apply to you: your recipe, your equipment, your market, your numbers. That’s the part I can’t answer in a paragraph.
Do you offer refunds?
Cancel more than 48 hours before your session and you’ll get a full refund. Cancellations inside 48 hours aren’t refundable, but I’m happy to reschedule you.
Book Your Session
Choose your session type and pick a time that works for you. Payment is taken at the time of booking, and you’ll get the Google Meet link straight away.