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Some Future Day evaluates technology at the intersection of culture & law.
Join Marc Beckman and his esteemed guests for insider knowledge surrounding how you can use new technologies to positively impact your life, career, and family. Marc Beckman is Senior Fellow of Emerging Technologies and an Adjunct Professor at NYU, CEO of DMA United, and a member of the New York State Bar Association’s Task Force on Cryptocurrency and Digital Assets.
Marc Beckman: [00:01:00] it is my pleasure to bring Smokin Ed Currie, the founder and president of Pucker Butt Pepper Company, onto Some Future Day today. Ed Currie, how are you today?
Ed Currie: Well, I'm doing well, man. How are you doing?
Marc Beckman: I'm great, I'm great. It's such an honor and a pleasure to meet you. clearly you are the leader in this [00:02:00] category. You grow, harvest, and produce all natural pepper products. Um, I understand your farm, from our previous conversation, is doing amazing right now with over 100, 000 plants that are grown on your farm every year. Ed, I gotta ask you, are you the modern day Gregor Mendel? But
Ed Currie: called the modern day Gregor Mendel. I've been called the Willy Wonka Peppers, you know? Uh, really, my wife just calls me an idiot. You know? I'm just a guy who has a little bit of talent, God given talent, that I, I get to have a lot of fun with. I love it.
Marc Beckman: really are, you really are tinkering. I mean,
Ed Currie: Yeah.
Marc Beckman: the numbers that we spoke about beforehand are astronomical. Like, how much harvest is your farm producing right now compared to, you know, an average pepper farm?
Ed Currie: in our category, the average pepper farms are very small. You know, you're talking 10 to 20 acres. So, they might be producing, you know, a quarter [00:03:00] pound to a half pound per plant, maybe doing 5, 000 plants per acre. We get about 10 times that at a minimum. Uh, this year we were shooting for a real record, but the, the hurricane blew through and all that water came down off the mountain, wiped out about, I don't know, 80, 90 percent of the crop.
But we were picking, uh, 50, you know, 50, 000 pounds of peppers at a time. You know,
Marc Beckman: Wow. That's really incredible. I'm sorry about the news for the hurricane for you and all of your members of the North Carolina community. And you're in South Carolina, actually, right? So I'm sorry that you guys went through that. How, just to throw it out there quickly, how are you doing now? Is everything in order, at least on your property?
Ed Currie: Yeah, we were lucky. All we got was the water that came off the mountains. Everybody is okay. Everything was fine. We just lost a lot of our peppers. You know, it's nothing compared to the devastation that we just drove through last night on the way back from Nashville. It is just, [00:04:00] uh, those people got hit hard, and, uh, we count our blessings every day that our family from up there is safe, and that everybody here is safe.
There's nothing material you cannot replace, but relationships are very hard to replace, you know?
Marc Beckman: That's for sure. That's Yeah. Well, thing, but I do know from, uh, researching with you that, um, you know, you really have used scientific methods to create these superior peppers. You've really done amazing things. So just take a second and tell the audience a little bit about your background.
Like, how did you get into farming and how do you apply science, um, to creating these super peppers?
Ed Currie: uh, I got into plants in general because my mother was a master gardener. Uh, and, uh, she taught me a lot about growing and breeding plants when we were young because she used her slave labor to do it, [00:05:00] you know? Uh, but, uh, Uh, uh, you know, being a child of the, uh, 70s, and I, I wanted to, uh, grow better marijuana, honestly.
That's, that's what I wanted to do, but it was illegal. Uh, so I learned about analyzing compounds inside of things, utilizing the chemistry and biology labs that were available to me at the time. And then I just applied that same science to peppers. Uh, my, my, my family told me I was going to die of heart disease or cancer.
And if I wanted to continue living the lifestyle I was living, which was not a very good one, uh, that I better do something about it. Uh, so I did research in a place called the library. Uh, which is a rare thing now. It's a place full of books that have facts in them. Uh, and I did research and it turned out that most of the indigenous populations around the world on the equator through the, in between the [00:06:00] tropics, uh, they have very little heart disease or cancer.
Uh, what they do do, all of them, is they eat hot peppers in every single meal. So that led me to that study and that led me to starting to breed peppers that, uh, had certain compounds that I thought were going to be able to keep me alive so I could keep on getting high.
Marc Beckman: That's really interesting. So I'm going to get into the, um, into the, the, uh, the health benefits and the medicinal benefits in a second. But I just want to go back to your company, specifically your name, Pucker Butt. Um, what, I'm so interested, like, what is a Pucker Butt?
Ed Currie: Well, um, my wife used to, uh, she was the, uh, director of the women's half of a Christian rescue mission that was founded by Billy Graham's dad down here. And, uh, I'm a Yankee. Every time it snowed, all these Southern women would say, hey, drive us here, drive us there. You know, with a quarter inch of snow, no one can drive down here.
Uh, so they were telling, [00:07:00] women have filthy toilet humor. Okay, and they were saying how every time they tried something I made, it made their butt pucker, you know, and I find, I blurted out, Well, if it doesn't make your butt pucker, it's not a pucker butt pepper. And they all cackled like hell, you know. And when they cackled, you know, when they got done, I went to LegalZoom, and the only thing that said pucker butt on LegalZoom were these bikinis with butt inserts in them.
So I trademarked it in the food segments because every time someone said that word they started smiling just like you.
And like, it's, now it's become the most identifiable brand in the category. It's pretty remarkable, actually.
Can you imagine that? A bunch of church women doing toilet humor made a worldwide brand for me.
Marc Beckman: I think that's amazing. But here's the real question. Yeah. Uh, else happens when people eat these hot peppers? Like, are your peppers lethal, Ed? Are [00:08:00] your peppers deadly?
Ed Currie: Capsaicin itself is deadly, uh, to your body. That's why we perceive heat. There is no actual heat. It's a reaction with a nerve receptor called the TRVP1 receptor that sends a signal to your brain. Hey, this is hot. Don't eat it because it's a low level poison. But you got, you know, I would have to eat about 300 pounds of pure capsaicin at once to die from it.
So, it's not like you're going to die from eating peppers. The only real medical, the only real thing that could possibly happen, do you have an allergy to nightshades, okay? If you're allergic to tomatoes, don't eat peppers. If you're allergic to eggplant, don't eat peppers. Or, do you have a pre existing medical condition that has to do with your heart or like aneurysms?
Uh, because peppers are really good for you and they elevate your [00:09:00] metabolism. Anywhere at the highest we've recorded so far is 42%. Uh, so, Forty two percent raise in your metabolism unexpectedly could do some things if you have some pre existing conditions. But other than that, there's really nothing that can happen to you other than a brain trick that's telling you you're on fire and you're going to die.
Uh, you've seen the physiological reactions, right? Like your eyes watering, your, you know, people's mucus coming out of the nose and mouth and stuff. Uh, Everybody gets that, no matter what. That's base brain reaction. But, you know, my peppers tend to do other things like, uh, we're gonna politely call it ring sting.
Okay, it doesn't just burn going in, it burns coming back out again, too. You know, and, uh, the really hot stuff gives men in particular, I don't know why the women don't experience it, but men in particular get something we like to call fire hose. [00:10:00] I was like, what the heck is happening? And I went and told my doctor, you know, the researcher that we're working with, what was happening when I eat this pepper oil? And she was like, it sounds like you got fire hose, you know? So we kind of coined the phrase. But it can burn. Those receptors are all over your body.
So it can burn anywhere. It feels like it's burning. But it's really a temporary thing.
Marc Beckman: just to back up, like you mentioned cap, I might be mispronouncing this, capsaicin, is that how you say it?
Ed Currie: Capsaicin is the predominant capsinoid that is in peppers. That's the one everybody knows the name of. There's actually many, many of them. Some scientists say seven, some scientists say 22. I've identified, you know, I've seen at least seven in the lab. I've, I've, I know we've seen more of them.
Marc Beckman: And then just so I understand. So it's the capsaicin that gives the human's brain the impression that [00:11:00] there's heat, that there's fire, but there's not actually heat.
Ed Currie: There is no actual heat. And it's all mammals, not just humans. Only mammals have those TRVP1 receptors. Uh, so there's, there's things you can do to cheat to make that not happen. Uh, but that's half the fun. See, uh, the part, like we were talking, when we were talking earlier, the, uh, the endorphin rush. That happens, you know, if you're a runner and you go, you're getting to that point of no return and you break through, all of a sudden you got an endorphin high, even though you look like you're going to die.
Okay. You're inside, you're feeling great. So capsaicin also fills dopamine receptors in your brain and you get an endorphin high just like that. You know, so, it makes you feel good, and when you feel good, you keep on doing the thing that makes you feel good. If you're like me, propensity to addiction. Or if you're a thrill [00:12:00] seeker, or stuff like that.
Marc Beckman: So it's interesting because you were very specific with your word selection. You said mammal and I was going to ask you, do birds feel the heat too? I read somewhere that birds actually don't feel the heat.
Ed Currie: No, no, no other, no other animal outside of the mammals feels the heat. Like we have our little bird feeder out back. I take about, you know, quarter ounce of, every time I put bird seed in, I take about a quarter ounce of reaper powder and I mix it up with the bird seed and put it in. The birds, Keep on coming.
They love the seed. But when a squirrel gets on there, it jumps around and rolls. It's a comedy show watching them roll around in the backyard.
Marc Beckman: Is that right?
Ed Currie: Yeah.
Marc Beckman: any
Ed Currie: Yep.
No, a Guinness Book of World Record, um, holder. Like, it's, it's pretty incredible. You've broke, as far as I understand, two Guinness Book of World Records, three Guinness Book of World Records now.[00:13:00]
Marc Beckman: So when you mention Reaper Powder, you're referencing Cali you're, you're first? world record is that your first one the carolina reaper right which was the world's hottest chili at the time it uh amounted to 1. 64 million scoville heat units. Ed, do you fear the Reaper?
Ed Currie: I have no fear of the Reaper, but pretty much everybody else in the world does.
Marc Beckman: this, I got to see the, I got to see those squirrels flipping out
Ed Currie: Yeah, it's it's
Marc Beckman: Carolina Reaper. I really got to see that
Ed Currie: Yeah,
Marc Beckman: But as far as I understand, the second Guinness World Record comes from your most modern creation, as far as I understand, you could correct me if I'm wrong, Pepper
Ed Currie: yeah, 5 4 0.
Marc Beckman: It's the, it to you. Pepper
Ed Currie: Yeah. Well, uh,
Marc Beckman: chili, which it seems like these numbers just blew away Carolina Reaper. Carolina Reaper was at 1. 64 million Scoville heat units, whereas with PepperX you went up to [00:14:00] 2. 69 million Scoville heat units. Um, I, I heard you mention, in fact, that you felt the heat for three hours after tasting it.
Tell me about this. How did you get PepperX? It's insane. It's insane.
Ed Currie: you know, we do a lot of breeding, okay, a lot of breeding, because I'm looking for compounds inside that can help in the medical community and can help with our manufacturing. You know, economy's a scale. A lot of people forget what they learned in school, but if you remember what you learned in school, you can take advantage of that and succeed in life, okay?
Always. I didn't, who knew that school wasn't just for drinking beer and smoking dope? Uh. Yeah, Uh. so, uh, the, the Scoville heat scale is a logarithmic scale, so my first record was for 1. 462 million Scoville heat units, second one 6. 4, 6. 4, or 6. 642 million, alright, so that, even [00:15:00] though that's a small jump, it's actually 1.
5 times as hot, because it's a logarithmic scale, so it's kind of like a curve. Uh, so the, the Pepper X, okay, is actually 3. 7 times hotter than the hottest Carolina Reaper we ever recorded.
Marc Beckman: That's wild.
Ed Currie: and it's crazy. So when I ate it, uh, The endorphin dump was so immediate that I kind of, they were filming me, and I kind of look like I'm just some guy looking around on mushrooms, you know.
I was distracted by the flashes. But the heat was so intense that every time I opened my mouth, just drool just kept on coming out. And I was, do you remember the flood? When was it, two years ago? Or last year, the flood over there in New York?
Marc Beckman: Yeah, of Okay, yeah, so it was the day before the rain, when the rain started, [00:16:00] alright, so I'm doing this thing with Hot Ones and we're filming and everybody's throwing up at me and they're filming me because I'm just talking like an idiot.
Ed Currie: And, uh, uh, they're like, okay, it's a wrap, and I'm like, oh, I didn't even know we had filmed yet, you know?
Marc Beckman: Eh.
Ed Currie: I was like, bleh, and they put me in the limo, and I started groaning, okay, because you get these things, we call them capsaicin cramps, what happens is the stomach lining doesn't like the poison either, your intestines don't like the poison either.
So it's extruding it out into the smooth muscle. And we get a cramp akin to a menstrual cramp. Uh, but when men feel it, we think we're dying. Okay, we don't have years of training. Uh, so I'm getting these cramps in the limo drivers, like asking my buddy who's with me, Hey, do we need to go to the hospital?
Hey, do we need to go to the hospital? Cause I'm like, Oh, I'm dying. [00:17:00] And the rain started and she, she whipped into that hotel, man. I'm telling you, she cut across traffic. I thought I was going to die. Uh, but they had a marble slab about two feet wide out in front of the hotel to keep the trucks from hitting things.
I laid down on that slab for three and a half hours in the rain,
Marc Beckman: literally
Ed Currie: literally could not move. Every time they tried to move me the pain was so intense that I would start screaming and crying. It hurt so bad that I wouldn't even, they were trying to baby bird me Haagen Dazs, you know, they were trying to baby pour, pour liquid into my mouth.
Marc Beckman: are your, these are your creations,
Ed Currie: Yeah,
Marc Beckman: your creations, but, you know, some people say that, the visual of these, uh, peppers, both the, the Carolina Reaper and Pepper X are gorgeous,
Ed Currie: yeah.
Marc Beckman: some actually say they're ugly, but, you know, there's, there's so much more to it than just what you're [00:18:00] building on the, on the Scoville scale, right?
I mean, these are, are beautiful, beautiful peppers, right?
Ed Currie: These are beautiful things. You know, we don't just go for heat, okay? Heat is a byproduct of it. Like I talked about earlier, economies of scale. I got the general, I essentially, I made a market. There were no real super hot pepper hot sauces going on. There were novelty items, but not super hot pepper hot sauces.
And I took the wise wisdom of some learned men in the industry. And I applied it to what I knew how to do. So we made this market, and we got the general public used to eating a certain heat level that they weren't used to eating before. So now with PepperX, I can make that same heat level with one quarter of the amount of product that I used to use.
Alright? I've made a plant that also produces more than the last one. [00:19:00] So I'm getting More peppers. I'm getting a lot more weight in peppers, but I'm only having to use a fourth of what I used to use to make the product that the general public enjoys.
Marc Beckman: So, Ed, let's talk about the business of hot sauce and the business of peppers for a second. It's pretty remarkable. The U. S. hot sauce market size today is a billion dollars and on the rise. What you're talking about is protecting some profit margin there for your company and perhaps even third party companies that are buying.
Ed Currie: It's for, product, yeah, it's for everybody, not just me. If we all succeed, we all succeed. Go ahead, I'm sorry for interrupting.
Marc Beckman: No, no, that's okay. So I'm just, I'm just curious. Like what trends are you seeing as it relates to the pepper market that, uh, they're beautiful. They're beautiful. For those of you at home that are listening, Ed just, uh, shared with the audience this [00:20:00] beautiful, um, photograph of actual peppers. I don't know if they're Carolina Reapers and Pepper X blended in there, but they really are beautiful,
Ed Currie: Yeah, All
Marc Beckman: Um, but Ed, we're seeing like this upward trajectory, like people are predicting, economists are predicting actually, that the hot sauce market will continue to grow. Um, what are the trends that you see contributing to this growth?
Ed Currie: The, really the news cycle and the TV cycle is catching up to something that happened a long time ago. Uh, hot sauce became the number one condiment in the United States in 2004, and there were a few of us on the front end of this trend. What happened was we opened up the floodgates to immigration here in the U.
S. and other countries in the world that have, you know, are influencers, uh, back in the late 80s and early, early 90s. So like when I was growing up in Richmond Hill, Okay, if you wanted exotic food, there was a [00:21:00] Chinese restaurant. Otherwise, your choices were Italian or the diner. You know, there was no exotic food.
Marc Beckman: I get it.
Ed Currie: Okay, so we moved to Michigan and their only choices are Chinese or American. You know, but then they opened the floodgates and all of a sudden there's a Thai restaurant. And there's a West African restaurant, and there's a Cuban restaurant, and there's, you know, there's all these new, new fangled things going on.
And it was the Mexican restaurants, uh, the small chains like Chi Chi's that became very large chains, that saw this trend of people daring to eat different food and monopolized on it. And as we, as a culture, got exposed to other flavors. Uh, they let us know that they had spicier stuff. Uh, so that palette for [00:22:00] adventure started.
Also, also, we got these things called cell phones. Okay, I don't know if you remember, uh, but my first cell phone weighed about 45 pounds.
Marc Beckman: I do Okay. connected to something
Ed Currie: Yeah.
Marc Beckman: It
Ed Currie: Yeah, a battery that lasted eight minutes and cost you like 40 bucks a minute to use.
Marc Beckman: Totally.
Ed Currie: But then all of a sudden they had cameras, okay, and people started doing stuff and filming each other and sharing that thing and then the internet came on.
So you had this weird conglomeration of new food, new spices. There was a guy named Dave Hirschkopf who came out with like Dave's Insanity, okay, and a guy in New Jersey, Blair Lazar, and there were, there were these small guys who did these, you know, really big things and took [00:23:00] advantage of this All this media, and all these people, and all this new technology, and it just blossomed.
So the hot sauce took over in 2004, over ketchup, mayonnaise, and mustard. But the media didn't know this. The public did, okay? Uh, and then, in, I think it was 2007, it was salsa took over ketchup, mustard. And Mayonnaise. So there has been a demand that has been growing in the United States since the middle 1990s.
It has just now gotten the eye of the big boys who want to make money off of this trend. So you're seeing it in like Inc. Magazine and Wall Street Journal and things like that.
Marc Beckman: I know you were covered even in Wired magazine. I was, it really caught my attention. So it's an interesting thing. You see this, it's almost like a triangle where, um, [00:24:00] all these different cultures enter the United States and create new demands for spices, for flavors. Um, with that, you also see the advent of technology with mobile phones.
Um, both cameras as well as social media, and bam, we see this explosion of demand for the hot sauce category. Um, are you also witnessing now, I know, I know predominantly hot sauces are, uh, distributed to the mass retailers, even places like Best Buy, I saw it at the Best Buy recently, but are you seeing a movement on your side into direct to consumer online sales?
Is that an area that's growing?
Ed Currie: Uh.
Marc Beckman: with the technology theme?
Ed Currie: Yeah, well, that's the only, I don't go to, I don't go to the market, I don't go, uh, into grocery or anything, like, our, our personally, I'm, I'm probably one of the biggest, uh, second tier hot sauce manufacturers, okay? Uh, big guys like Tabasco, Franks, [00:25:00] that kind of thing, they're, let them play their game. Uh, but I'm probably the biggest in the next tier.
Uh, so. I've only done internet, uh, because I see, I don't see relationship when I go to the grocery store and I grab a bottle off the shelf. Uh, but if I'm buying it off a website, there's also a real person who's going to answer the phone there or reply to my question or whatever. And building relationship is how you build a brand.
All the successful brands in the United States were built on relationship. And I'm not talking in the last 20 years of the tech boom. I'm talking about long term brands. Handshakes, verbal communication, uh, you know, written communication. So I've only stayed in the, uh, in that internet space. Because I believe that direct to consumer is the way to go.
Uh, the consumer needs to know that they have [00:26:00] someone to talk to. Uh, but, you know, we're getting offers now from retailers that we might not be able to refuse. But that changes who you are and what you do. Alright,
and, also cut into your profit margin significantly, I imagine.
well, we've talked before, you know I'm not a guy who really worries about, every time I make a dime, I, I turn around and spend it on the company or on an individual, you know, Yeah. because we're supposed to be building a community together. As employers, uh, so I see all these people around here who need jobs.
So if we make an extra dollar, I hire an extra person. Uh, we might not need them, but I find something for them to do. And I show them they can do in life. And that's just the way it is.
Marc Beckman: the, staying focused on the online side? I think it's really interesting because it also allows you to speak to different segments of society, right? Not just with like, um, ethnicities, which is kind of what you implied [00:27:00] before with the immigration, but, culturally, I see, for example, the culinary community embracing hot sauce and peppers in one way versus perhaps the hip hop community.
Like, are you, does that give you that flexibility to hit these different cultures as well?
Ed Currie: yeah, it really does. And like, and, and I'll give you an example. Uh, it's the, uh, The power of an email. Okay, we get emails all the time saying, hey, I'm this, hey, I'm that. Can Ed give me a call back? You know, uh, but I got a call one time, all right, because they had reached out to the website. and I get a call, and I'm working, I'm grinding peppers, and I'm feeling spicy, and getting, getting, getting a little high, and he goes, hey, this is David Blaine.
And I said, yeah, right, it is. Click. I hung up.
Marc Beckman: Yeah. You know, up on David Blaine.
Ed Currie: yeah, and a call came through again, and he goes, no, this is really David Blaine, and I was like, yeah, I'm busy, you know, [00:28:00] I thought it was a prank call. Well, the third call was a FaceTime call, and it was David Blaine, okay? but David Blaine wasn't calling to say, hey, I know you're, you, I saw you on TV or anything like that.
He was like, hey, I want to make this dish, okay? And I was like, okay. And I want your opinion, you know, and it's that internet community, that, uh, direct to consumer community, uh, that my team now takes advantage of with social media also, that a guy who I never even knew liked hot sauce, who I've met before.
Uh, now we're, we're having interaction and relationship. On a level that doesn't have to do with, you know, out there in the world, it has to do with here in our hearts. Do you see what I'm saying?
Marc Beckman: I totally do. I really do.
Ed Currie: That's the tool that I think people are missing when they think about internet sales. [00:29:00] They're thinking, oh, I can reach all these people and make all this money.
Forget about making money. Make relationships. The money will come along if you do the right thing. You know, uh, it's what's missing in the U. S. right now. Hopefully that's going to change real soon. Uh, but relationship is what, you know, building relationship builds a business. You know, and then there's stupid stuff too, like, I had no idea what a tickety tock was.
Uh, you know, I'm 61 years old. I don't, I really don't care about social media. Uh, but I hired these young kids. Who had done work with other, other YouTube people and stuff. And they had me dancing for the camera, you know. And I was like, this is real stupid, I'm not going to do this stuff. You know, I'm an adult, I have to.
And they're like, no, do it, please. And you know, surprisingly, tons of people reach out for [00:30:00] that. Okay? And then, like, here, we're, we're just south of Charlotte. There's a lot of musicians that come to town. When they come to town, we get calls at the store. Hey, you know, we're with Trans Siberian Orchestra. We need some hot sauce for our tour bus.
The food stinks. Can you bring up some hot sauce? You know, or we're with whatever band. I just mentioned them because Chris reached out to me yesterday to us and they're about to go on tour. And he reached out. Yeah. He said, yeah.
Marc Beckman: segment of society, like culturally speaking, like athletes, uh, musicians, doctors, culinary, where do you see, uh, the next phase of growth in the hot sauce sector?
Ed Currie: I think it's going to be the music industry. You do. Uh, yeah, the word has been spreading for, there, I have a lot of friends in the music industry and they've kept very quiet about it for years. Cause they, you know, tour buses suck. Okay, let's just say it right [00:31:00] out. Yeah, off of a bus sucks, the food truck sucks, there's no good food.
Uh, so they know that they need stuff to, uh, add to, uh, whatever's being made to make it taste good. Uh, so I really think that, that music world, uh, From the musician standpoint, uh, from the touring standpoint, they're really going to take on to this. Uh, but what's going to come out of it is the creative side of the musician or the musician, excuse me, the music, the creative people are going to, oh, what can we do with this?
Let's change this or, hey, I want to make this.
Okay. so you'll work with these artists to create their own recipe, is that what you're, you're
Yeah.
Marc Beckman: creativity comes through the product itself or the packaging or,
Ed Currie: Yeah, through all of it, they're involved in every part of it. I've had the honor to work with some really, really, really big artists in the past few years. [00:32:00] And, uh, All of the work was just for themselves. They didn't want a product that was out there on the market. They wanted something that they could call their own and that they could make themselves and friends.
But now they're talking about, hey, how do I get this in a package? How do I do this? How do I do that? Because they see that by building the relationships they have and, you know, gifting their friends, that it's a product that is wanted.
Marc Beckman: that's
Ed Currie: So
Marc Beckman: So, so Ed, I want to ask you, there are a few myths and facts regarding, um, peppers and hot sauce that I want to, I want to cover with you right now. I think it's important that we, you know, we have the, the legendary Ed Currie on right now and I want to make sure that all of these issues are resolved.
So, My first question to you is, like, is there an actual cure for the heat? If I eat Pepper X, like, can I cool that off? Is there something I could do? Drink water, drink milk, like, is there anything that cures the heat?
Ed Currie: [00:33:00] Time is the only cure for the heat. It's a chemical reaction. Our body perceives this heat. The capsaicin is in an oil, oleo resin that is coating your mouth. So like the only thing I've found that shortens the time is citric acid, lime juice, lemon juice, grapefruit juice. But don't drink it because you're just moving it to your gut and you're going to cause problems.
More cribs. You swish it around in your mouth, spit it out, it gets rid of some of that fuel for the fire. Do you understand what I'm saying?
Yeah, follow. You're making me think about, um, a friend of mine said recently that she has terrible ulcers, and they told her not to have salsa, not to have hot sauce. Is that a myth?
that's a myth, too. Capsaicin and peppers actually rejuvenate the linings inside your stomach. They just got done a five year, I told, not to be too personal, but I was having a colonoscopy and I was talking to the doctor about it because he [00:34:00] knew I did medical research with some of the other doctors up there.
And he's like, no, that's not, that's not how it works. And I said, yeah, it is how it works. It rejuvenates the stomach lining. Why don't you look into it? And they just got a ton of five year study that proved that eating peppers is great for your digestive system.
Marc Beckman: That's pretty cool. Are there other health benefits to eating peppers, Ed?
Ed Currie: Yeah, if you can get, uh, certain capsaicins to, uh, uh, A cancer cell, it'll cost what's essentially an autoimmune sequence and kill the cancer cell. The problem is the delivery method. I might eat a whole bunch of super hot peppers every day, but an average human being does not wanna go
Marc Beckman: do
Ed Currie: Yeah, does wanna,
Marc Beckman: could do
Ed Currie: does not want to go through I what I go through.
So there's research going on there. Uh, there's been research in, uh, heart disease and, uh, blood diseases for a long time because caps states incar the blood quite. Literally, uh, just like fuel. [00:35:00] Uh, obesity, there's a doctor at Stanford who's been curing, taking morbidly obese kids, morbidly, like three, 400 pounds and getting them back to a normal rate using Carolina Reaper in there as a supplement in their
diet. So go with Carolina Reaper to fight obesity, not ozempic.
Yeah, I've just, look, there's no shortcuts. Okay. Uh, the only thing that makes you change is change itself. Alright, if you're, if you're shooting, said. yeah, if you're shooting a drug in you, you're either going to get the side effect from the drug, or you're just going to have a bounce back that's worse. And time and time again, that's been proven.
But like, I, me and my partner, uh, and I call him my partner, he's, you know, he helped me get this thing going. Uh, we went up to do a challenge with the ALS unit here in Charlotte. Had no idea they had been researching using peppers to help mitigate all the side effects of [00:36:00] ALS.
Marc Beckman: Wow.
Ed Currie: Yeah, uh, but,
Marc Beckman: That's remarkable,
Ed Currie: yeah, and there's stuff going on with Parkinson's, there's, and besides all that, there's already stuff people don't know about.
You know sports creams?
Marc Beckman: Yeah, of
Ed Currie: You know how you feel heat when you put on a patch or something?
Marc Beckman: No, I don't.
Ed Currie: No, you've never put on one of those, uh,
Marc Beckman: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I understand that. I feel the heat, but I don't know how it's delivered. Is that through
Ed Currie: It's, it's pepper, okay? And it's, they, they use the compound, uh, from the capsaicin to make pain relievers.
Marc Beckman: So wait, like, so I was thinking about, um, is pepper spray, does that actually have pepper in it too? It does?
Ed Currie: does. There's, some companies use chemicals. A lot of companies use jalapenos and just, they boil down a crap ton of jalapenos because they're cheap. Uh, but,
Marc Beckman: peppers are in pepper spray.
Ed Currie: Yeah, but like we can deliver, we, we've worked with a company that does bear spray, and we can [00:37:00] deliver a much greater product. Like I showed, I showed a colonel at the US Army because they, they literally grow fields for, for pepper sprays, and I showed them how we could do for a quarter of what they were, the work they were doing, they could get three times as much product at the end by using a hotter pepper, but
Marc Beckman: Pepper X, right?
Ed Currie: Well this at the time it was the Reaper, but people are afraid because they think like I got some peppers in the fridge.
They think what's on the outside of a pepper is dangerous. And they think, oh, if you touch it and you touch your eye, you're gonna die. And it's not. It's what's on the inside that's dangerous. And if you touch it and you get, touch that stuff and you touch your eye, your eye's gonna burn for five minutes and then you'll be fine.
Okay, they, they don't understand, uh, the real science behind peppers.
Marc Beckman: how much hotter is PepperX versus a jalapeno pepper?
Ed Currie: [00:38:00] mathematically, it's, uh, 5, 000 times hotter.
Marc Beckman: Oh my
Ed Currie: Okay, but,
Marc Beckman: not going to
Ed Currie: no, no, no, no,
Marc Beckman: not
Ed Currie: no, no, no.
no.
Marc Beckman: That's crazy. 5,
Ed Currie: we're,
Marc Beckman: times hotter.
Ed Currie: yeah, we're actually, we're controlling this one. We're actually the only place in the whole world where you can get it. Uh, and it's not about the general public, and it's not about my friends in the hot sauce industry.
We're patenting the pepper, uh, because with the Carolina Reaper, so many major corporations took advantage of my kindness, and then gave me the finger, you know, and actually some of them took me to court, you know, to try to get rid of my trademarks. Names that I came up with, you know. So we're protecting ourselves from the major corporations who like to use other people's products and then take advantage of them.
Uh, and as soon as that work, the lawyers tell me that work's done, I'm going to release this stuff to the world because I can't wait to see the videos, you know.
Marc Beckman: [00:39:00] Ed, those are, are the, are those lawsuits public? Could you, can you name which companies are stealing from you?
Ed Currie: Uh, I don't know. I'd have to, I, see, I like doing what I do. I, I make peppers. I farm, you know, get it, I'm, I'm happy.
Marc Beckman: I don't want to rock the boat anyway, but I do, I know, I know this when you talk about your names. We've been focused on your peppers, really. But you've also had some iconic hot sauces with iconic names. Like what would you say are your top three bestselling hot sauces packaged, final product, in history?
Ed Currie: In history, the top three are Voodoo Prince, Death Mamba, I Dare You Stupid, which Yeah, and, you know, we, uh, number one seller of all time still, though, Pepper X Squeezins is coming up, Reaper Squeezins. And people were like, what's a Squeezins? If you've been in the South, you know what Squeezins are, you know?
Uh, cause, uh, down [00:40:00] here everybody has Squeezins, you know, for a little sip in the afternoon.
Yeah. names are ferocious, your creativity's interesting, your, Love and passion for peppers are incredible, but you're also a, an individual who loves superior design and I would be remiss to not mention the fact that you are sitting In a Frank Lloyd Wright home, and, um, that's remarkable.
Marc Beckman: I've personally been a big fan of Frank Lloyd Wright for years as, um, I think anybody who loves the arts and culture would agree that he, he really did move, um, the architectural and design world in a, in a massive, massive way. How did you come about
Ed Currie: Look at this.
Marc Beckman: a Frank Lloyd Wright home?
Ed Currie: Isn't this cool?
Marc Beckman: Tell me what we're looking at.
Ed Currie: This is just like our breakfast nook.
Marc Beckman: Amazing. So what, how long have you been living in this home?
Ed Currie: Well, my [00:41:00] father died, I think it was, uh Uh, seven years ago, and he had built this to retire in. He, he got a plan from the Frank, Frank Lloyd Wright house, and, uh, when he died, my brother, you know, he didn't allow me, I never had a key to this house. This is fine. My dad didn't trust me. He knew who, who, who, I was. Yeah. Well, you know, he, he watched me through my addiction. Okay. Uh, he would let my wife borrow his car, but I never got to borrow his car once. Okay. Uh, but, uh, when he died, my brothers, my one brother had his own place already. My other one lived in New York. So, uh, we had two small kids through the Miracle Gift of Adoption.
And, uh, we needed a place to move to. So I, I bought out my brother's, uh, well actually my mo my wife bought it out 'cause my father wouldn't sell it to, you know, his, his estate would not sell it to me.
Marc Beckman: [00:42:00] Wow.
is the whole home built and designed by Frank Lloyd Wright? Is it original?
Ed Currie: it's an original plan. Uh, I see. a student from the school, uh, built, followed the plan and had the house built. He followed, he did the construction.
Marc Beckman: Amazing. That's really cool, Ed. I appreciate that. And I also, I would be remiss to not, uh, mention on a personal level, I heard you, uh, say that you have adopted some children. If you want to take a second and tell our, our audience how important that experience is for you, where would you rank adoption with regards to your accomplishments on a personal level?
Ed Currie: My accomplishments on a personal level mean nothing compared to adoption. Adoption is the very best gift. I thought for a long time that recovery was the best gift that I've ever been given. But adoption, the miracle gift of adoption. For the person who's doing the [00:43:00] adoption, everybody thinks it's about the kid.
It's not about the kid. This has been a life changing, it's been a life, sorry, it's been a life changing miracle that I truly believe it's not for everybody, but everybody should try it, okay? Because it's about dedication, it's about sacrifice, it's about love. And I thought I knew what love was when I met my current bride, but I had no idea what love was until I met my children, okay?
And I had no idea what God's love was.
Marc Beckman: Ed, how old were your children when you adopted them?
Ed Currie: Miracles. My wife cut the cord on both of them and we received them at birth. We were the only parents. We stayed in the hospital for the three days and took them home. They've been our kids since the cord was [00:44:00] cut.
Marc Beckman: appreciate it. I, I know you're getting teary eyed and I gotta be honest, like, I, I, getting to know you a little bit, I could tell the difference between your tears from Pepper X and your tears from telling, being so personal.
I know this is real and you're making me cry.
Ed Currie: My heart is so full of joy right now just thinking about it.
Marc Beckman: my friend. It's the most beautiful thing in the world, truly.
Ed Currie: it really is. I have me, a drug addict, alcoholic, retrograde who doesn't even deserve to live. Okay, really doesn't for the filthy, horrible things I've done in life. Not only got the gift of redemption and recovery, was able to build a business, was married up significantly to an amazing woman, [00:45:00] and then was given the gift of a family.
Okay, miracles happen. Miracles happen when our hearts become the guideposts of our lives instead of our heads. Alright, and I can tell you when that switched, cause I've been, like, getting back to the Peppers, I've been studying Peppers since 1981. I got offers from people who sold businesses for the 300s and 500 millions to be there at the start.
But I was thinking with my head, not my heart. The minute I started thinking with my heart, my whole life changed.
Marc Beckman: so, Ed, the, um, the show always ends on the same note, and I, I don't think that we could end any stronger than where we are right now. guest I have, um, at the end finishes a sentence that I begin. It's the name of the show. It starts off with Some Future Day. So are you game for playing this with [00:46:00] me to finalize the show to shut this episode down?
Ed Currie: I love you, brother. I'm game for anything.
Marc Beckman: All right, cool. So in Some Future Day. Some Future Day, Pucker Butt Pepper Company will become,
Ed Currie: The world leader in medical research for cancer and heart disease.
Marc Beckman: Ed Currie, you're an amazing human being. Thank you so much for being so insightful today from a personal perspective, from a visionary perspective, and schooling everybody about the business of peppers. Thank you so much, Ed. I really appreciate
Ed Currie: No, it's really an honor. I was, I was surprised that you would want to listen to me. I mean, you get to talk to famous people all the time. I'm just a farmer.
Marc Beckman: my
Ed Currie: I'm a farmer from South Carolina, man. That's what I am.
Marc Beckman: You're awesome.
Ed Currie: I love you
Marc Beckman: much.
Ed Currie: Awesome. Take care.