Drew Davis uses humor to produce spicy condiments in St. Louis

Not many companies begin as a B-minus school project. Then again, not many companies are like Crippling Hot Sauce. 

Founded in 2023 by Drew Davis, who has cerebral palsy, the St. Louis-based hot sauce company produces a variety of fiery flavors with a sense of humor that Davis says is common among people in the disabled community. The resulting combination is a selection of must-try sauces that serve an admirable cause—and prove Davis’s high school teacher wrong. 

“I thought I deserved better on my project, so I went up and asked the teacher why he gave me a B-minus,” Davis says. “He thought it was unrealistic, so I used that motivation to launch my company.”

Davis launched Crippling Hot Sauce in his personal kitchen before scaling up to a commercial kitchen. Now, he’s at full-scale manufacturing and has totaled more than $2 million in sales. The company offers six flavors ranging in heat and taste, all with tongue-in-cheek names that gently allude to being disabled. 

The original flavors include Crippling Agony (hot), Limping (medium), and Just for the Parking (mild), all of which can be purchased as a starter pack entitled the Triple Cripple Bundle. As for a rewards program? Davis thought of that, too. It’s called Palsy Points. 

“The reason why I ended up going with hot sauce was because, obviously, I thought the name was funny,” Davis says. “But furthermore, the reason I got into hot sauce in the first place was when I was 14, I weighed 300 pounds. I then decided to lose 150 pounds. So, hot sauce was the one condiment that didn’t have many calories that I could put on my food and make it taste better.”

Crippling Hot Sauce sources locally-grown ingredients—and even makes bottle stickers in St. Louis. The company also contributes 5 percent of sales to cerebral palsy research, donating more than $22,000 in just two years. Looking ahead, Davis hopes to expand into more retailers, while also focusing on attending more in-person events. He wants to meet more people and share his story and the story of other disabled people.

“More broadly speaking, the whole goal with Crippling is to showcase the humor that a lot of us have,” Davis says. “[I want] to show that a lot of us want to be treated as normal people and that we have a sense of humor. We can do the same things as you. That’s why I chose the name ‘Crippling.’ That’s the sense of humor that a lot of people in the disabled community have and a lot of people don’t know that.”

Crippling Hot Sauce products are available online and in local stores throughout the region, including Schnucks.