About Us

A Mount Pleasant couple, John and Mary Rhea, have turned their homemade blends into a commercial venture called Charleston Original Sauces. "My wife and I have been making cocktail sauce to enjoy with our favorite seafood, especially oysters, for some time and decided to start a company so everyone else could enjoy it, too," says John Rhea.

The husband and wife, born and raised in Charleston, first met when they were 11 and dated through high school. Thereafter, their lives diverged until 23 years later. "We are now married raising our blended family of seven boys. To add to the excitement, we had our own baby — yes ... a girl!"

The Rheas always have shared a love of Lowcountry waters and its bounty of crabs, shrimp and oysters. "Our affinity for great seafood was established at an early age," he says, and the sauces were a natural extension of that.