SUNY Oswego - Alumni Association - December E-Newsletter

December 2010 • Vol 6 No 9

Film Veteran Tries Fire, Builds Business

One taste is all it took.

JD Cowles '81 and his not-so-secret sauce. Television personality George Lopez is a fan.

Ever since his tongue first tingled from Buffalo-style chicken wings in Oswego, JD Cowles ’79 has added spice to life at backyard barbecues, in break rooms around the world and most recently on the web.

While he spends his digital artist day job working on blockbuster films like “The Matrix,” “Spiderman” and “Alice in Wonderland,” Cowles has been getting down to business at his virtual All Spice Café since 2005.

“Hot sauce for me really started with Buffalo wings,” said Cowles, who currently works with Sony Imageworks in Los Angeles. “First time I tried chicken wings, I was like, ‘Oh my God, this is amazing.’”

It began a longtime love affair with all things spicy. Eager to improve on the hot-sauce-and-stick-of-butter combination that made up most wing coatings in the late ’70s, Cowles introduced his first habanero- and cayenne-infused creations at backyard barbecues.

His homemade heat made its way around the world while Cowles was working with Kodak during the ’80s and ’90s. He taught people how to use the Cineon digital film system and when he was done with assignments he used his own brand of guerilla marketing, leaving his sauce behind in kitchens and break areas.

“All of a sudden, I’d be getting e-mails from Italy or London; all these different places” asking for more of the sauce, Cowles said.

After some small-scale success at a California home show, Cowles started production from his apartment kitchen and quickly earned coveted Scovie and Golden Chili awards.

“In the hot sauce world, those are like the Academy Awards,” explained Cowles, who was also named “Best Hot Sauce Maker” in the 2008 "Best of LA" edition of Los Angeles magazine. He has made a high-profile fan in George Lopez, who got a taste of some sauces that Cowles donated for a National Kidney Foundation benefit.

Despite the name of his company, he is still in search of a bricks-and-mortar café to serve as HQ for his fiery products. Cowles calls himself a “bi-coastal commuter,” as he travels very frequently to Rochester, where his wife, Joan Garvey Cowles ’81, and children live.

He hopes to establish a foothold for his sauces in the East and take the All Spice business full time.

— Shane M. Liebler

PHOTO CAPTION:
All Spice Café co-founder JD Cowles ’79 poses with his signature sauces on the shelves at Whole Foods Market in Venice Beach, Calif. The digital artist is literally the face of the award-winning franchise.

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Who doesn’t want to save the world? Michael Kite ’02 does that for a living through World Wildlife Fund.

As marketing specialist for one of the world’s leading conservation organizations, Kite and his team of three work to raise more than $5 million each year. The majority of that money comes from licensing partnerships and promotions with the likes of Barnes & Noble, Gap, Hewlett-Packard, Dial and Coinstar.

Retail partnerships help WWF spread its message to the general public and raise funds for its conservation work around the globe. For example, Bank of America contributes $100 for every special Visa account opened and Nabisco is supporting WWF’s “Year of the Tiger” initiative with special packaging and a $100,000 donation. The new CVS Green Bag Tag program rewards reusable bag-toting customers, and generates five cents for WWF for each tag sold.

All support WWF’s mission of protecting the future of nature, down to the finest details, Kite said.

“We like to see that the product is made from recycled material and is recyclable itself, and somehow ties into our mission,” Kite said. The Green Bag Tag, for instance, is made from a corn-based material and features a 100 percent recycled silicone lanyard.

As a broadcasting major at Oswego, Kite got involved with WRVO-FM and WNYO-FM.

“I think it gave me a lot more confidence in talking to people,” he said. It was an important part of his early career in broadcast sales and remains an important piece in the message he “sells” today.

“The best part of my job is seeing a product in the store with the WWF logo after months of working with a company to launch it,” said Kite, who joined the organization in 2006. “It’s rewarding to give people a fun, unique way to protect our planet.”

— Shane M. Liebler