Pink Sauce creator Veronica Shaw has started a GoFundMe, saying she’s completely broke and was “financially sabotaged” by Dave’s Gourmet after putting her sauce on the market in 2022.
Veronica Shaw, aka ‘Chef Pii,’ went viral in 2022 thanks to her brightly-colored condiment called “pink sauce.”
Shaw quickly saw the opportunity to take her product to the next level and started selling the sauce out of her home. This was a move highly criticized by customers, some of whom complained their sauce had spoiled in the summer heat, among other issues.
Despite the controversy surrounding Pink Sauce, Dave’s Gourmet soon picked up the viral dressing later that year and found itself on shelves in retailers like Walmart.
However, this money move didn’t seem to pay off for Shaw, who recently started a GoFundMe page, saying she’s financially destitute after partnering with Dave’s Gourmet.
Pink Sauce creator says she lives on “$20 a day”
In her GoFundMe, Shaw claims that Dave’s Gourmet “are not paying me and are not being transparent about records” of their business arrangement.
“As a young entrepreneur with big dreams, I followed my intuition and went forth toward my dreams to create something new,” she says. “I made a few mistakes on the way. Which led me to trust a company that is trying to take everything away from me. They lied to me.”
“I have been silenced and financially sabotaged,” she added. “I am a single mom and I do everything for my kids. Right now, I don’t even have enough money to buy my kids food on my own. My mom is on disability and has been giving us $20 just to get by on a daily basis.”
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Shaw’s GoFundMe fundraiser is set at $100,000 — but thus far, she’s only raised just over $900. Some users are even roasting her in the page’s comments.
“Karma sucks huh?” one person wrote after donating $5. “Be humble.”
Dave’s Gourmet says it’s paid Pink Sauce creator over $120k
For their part, Dave’s Gourmet says it disagrees with Shaw’s version of events. They also claim they stuck to the terms of their agreement and say they’ve paid the Pink Sauce creator over $120,000 thus far.
“Dave’s Gourmet has adhered to the terms of the agreement with Ms. Shaw,” they said in a statement shared with Dexerto. “We disagree with Ms. Shaw’s allegations. Dave’s Gourmet has paid Chef Pii over $120,000 to date and it continues to make all payments as due and on time based upon the terms of the contract.”
“We’ve offered to reimburse Ms. Shaw for her lawyer’s time to go over the terms of the agreement and how it relates to the payments that were made to Ms. Shaw. She indicated that she’s open to an amicable resolution of the dispute and the parties are in discussions.”
This latest news follows sightings of Pink Sauce on the clearance aisle in Walmart earlier this year.