The Sauce Boss
PROJECT OVERVIEW
Project Summary: The Sauce Boss is a food lifestyle spec campaign conceived, sketched, art directed, and photographed by Suzanne Clements. It carries one character concept across three formats: tabletop, hands-only, and partial-body talent.
Hot Honey. Plain Donuts. Zero Apologies.
You Gotta Build your identity out of something. Why not flavor?
Hot honey is everywhere right now. It’s drizzled on pizza, fried chicken, and anything essentially edible. The Sauce Boss takes this condiment from its Southern roots and dunks it into your morning routine.
Meet our main character. She's college-aged, eclectic, and feeling out what her thing is one snack at a time. Between classes she cracks open a box of plain donuts and a jar of chili-flecked honey, and she makes something uniquely hers. She's confident, a little off kilter, and very much eating her cake too.
THE SKETCHES
How it started: I knew I wanted to build something around America’s favorite food accessory, sauce. I just had to work out a way for me to lean into it and approach it differently from other saucy shoots out there. I like to weave things together with a story, a concept, or a color palette. There has to be a reason to keep clicking. It needs to be fun and catch your eye.
I did some preliminary concepting and then talked with my prop and wardrobe stylist, Julie Johnson, who delivered the color theme. I loved it. So unlike anything else I’ve curated on my own, the bold red, the mint green, the pop of cheerful yellow and a grounding black gave me that art school vibe I needed to ignite this project.
Final ASSETS
Three formats, one character, one very sticky set. The goal was a library a brand could actually run with: product heroes, social-ready detail shots, and personality-packed talent frames that all speak the same language.
~25 vibrant talent stills
Tierney brought the swagger and we kept the shutter rolling. Mid-pour, mid-bite, mid-scheme: a deep bench of expressive frames ready to mix, match, and stretch across platforms.
1 bold tabletop
Shot in such a way that I can shuffle and reshuffle elements to modify the composition to fit any layout.
2 sticky hands-on moments
Glossy, drippy, and framed by the happy chaos of dorm life, these shots lean into the adventure of it all.
THE CREATIVE ASK
Created as a spec campaign, The Sauce Boss treats a condiment trend like a character study.
Identity on a plate
Today, food says who you are. Our Sauce Boss’s signature move is a little weird and totally hers. Celebrating the smash-up.
A drip with a plan
Our food stylist planned ahead and slowed our honey waaaay down, cooking it down to concentrate it and give it a gentle crawl on set, allowing me to capture dozens of frames.
Colors that absolutely sing
Red walls frame every jubilant shot, while pops of mint, marigold, and yellow punctuate each moment.
One character, three setups
The shot list stayed simple so the energy could stay high:
Tabletop
Hands-only curated drips
Partial-body all energy
ROLES, RESPONSIBILITIES, & PRODUCTION FLOW
From sketchbook to final retouch, The Sauce Boss came together through a small, generous crew and a lot of honey.
Casting
We sourced our Sauce Boss via Level Talent agency out of Tampa. They gave us lots of great options, but we absolutely fell in love with Tierney Pittman.
Wardrobe
Stylist Julie Johnson (from Wisconsin/Chicago) dove into the project and practically pulled the wardrobe right out of the sketches.
Hair & Makeup
Kellielynn Dreher did an amazing job taking a look at what we were going for with the sketches and suggesting creating some faux bangs with Tierney’s hair. It was perfect and that candy-colored lip? It’s too much… it’s perfect.
Food Styling
Miki Knowles and I talked game plan a few days ahead of the shoot and, as always, arrived ready to rumble and make the dream come true.
Props
Julie Johnson pulled double duty with props.
Location
Cornelius O’Donoghue at Go Bold Studio in Casselberry, Florida, graciously opened the doors to our chaos and joined us on set to capture some motion clips as well!
Production Coordination
Producer Carol Matlock lit the fuse, helping me coordinate the team, identify a casting agency, confirm our talent, and make sure we were all aligned on shoot day. We were sad not to have her along for the day of, but it wouldn’t have been the same without her in pre-production.
Photography & Creative Direction
As photographer and creative director, I built the concept, drew every setup, and set the palette in motion before we stepped on set. On shoot day I directed talent through each frame with a camera crew of Shane Valentine, Dalvin Maysonet, and Carlos Irazabal keeping things moving, while Parker Dunford held down production on set. I directed talent through each frame, kept an eye on the drip timing (with help from digitech Justin Green), and made the calls on wardrobe and set.
Post Production
I handled selects and retouching in-house, balancing color across all three formats so the reds, mints, and marigolds match from tabletop to talent. Everything was captured in camera.
RECOGNITION
I want to thank everyone involved in making this imagined campaign come to life. They did an amazing job on this project and you should consider pulling them onto your next production.
Carol Matlock, Producer | @carol_matlock
Miki Knowles, Food Stylist | @mikiknowles
Julie Johnson, Wardrobe + Prop Stylist | @juliejohnsonfromwisconsin
Kellielynn Dreher, Hair & Makeup | @kellielynndreher
Justin Green, Digitech | @justingreenphotography
Shane Valentine, Camera Assist | @shanevalentinephoto
Dalvin Maysonet, Camera Assist + BTS | @m._.dlv
Carlos Irazabal, Camera Assist | @carlos_irazabal
Cornelius O'Donoghue, Motion + Studio | @corneliusodonoghue
Parker Dunford, Production Assistant | @not_parker_lewis
Go Bold Studio, Studio/Location | @gobold.studio
Pro Gear Orlando, Lighting Rental | @progearorlando
TALENT
Tierney Pittman (via Level Talent) | @tierneyrenee_
