AUSTIN, Texas – Barbecue has a long and proud history in Texas. It’s a key aspect not only of the Lone Star State’s cowboy image and heritage, but also a celebrated part of the diverse culinary tradition of the US.

Southside Market & Barbeque was established in 1882 outside Elgin, Texas. For its first four years, meat was sold door to door before the business opened its first storefront in downtown Elgin, offering counter-service sales of fresh meats as well as meat smoked in the back of the building.

While ownership of the business has changed a few times in its 140-plus years, Southside Market & Barbeque’s smoked meats are still made using traditional “low and slow” Texas offset smoking, said Southside Market & Barbeque owner Bryan Bracewell.

“The cooking process has remained the same, the wood has remained the same, the style of the pit has evolved a little bit over time,” Bracewell said. “The one thing that I have really appreciated about our business is that it’s just the typical small-town business that learned how to roll with the punches from the early days. We sold what we had available -- animals that were grown in the area. We cooked them with the trees that were grown in the area. It was all with local methods and local ingredients.”

Bracewell’s grandfather, who was a traveling meat salesman for Armour, bought the business – one of his accounts-- in 1968. The transaction included the in-town butcher shop/barbecue joint as well as a harvest plant outside of town.

“My grandfather with his history in meat distribution with Armour started putting trucks on the road and selling sides of beef to a little grocery company called H-E-B,” Bracewell said. “Our distribution arm of our business started out as selling swinging beef to the local grocery stores. He added the sausage we made to the trucks simply as a way to get more pounds on the trucks.”

As the business of meat distribution evolved, swinging beef sales went away, but the sausage sales remained, evolving away from bulk fresh sales.

“When I got into the business in 1998, 95% of the sausage we sold was fresh, raw, and 5% or less was fully cooked smoked,” said Bracewell, who is a Texas A&M University-trained meat scientist. “Now that’s totally flipped. The fully cooked, smoked four-link single pack or 12-link family pack is 95% of our sales at the grocery store.”

Southside Market & Barbeque’s restaurant operation has evolved as well, with locations in Elgin, Bastop, Hutto and Austin. Southside Market & Barbeque’s fifth location is currently under construction in Leander. Each location includes a small butcher shop/meat market, with every menu item for sale.

“We used to be the meat market that sold barbecue in the back,” Bracewell said. “Our business has evolved into the barbecue restaurant that has fresh meat they sell on the side.”

Retail reach

Southside Market & Barbeque’s current roster of retailer clients includes H-E-B, Walmart and Kroger, as well as some smaller Austin-area grocers, Bracewell said. While product distribution sometimes extends into neighboring states like Louisiana and Arkansas, the majority of sales remain in Texas. Direct-to-consumer e-commerce sales continue to be a growing sales channel for the business too. “It’s been a growing part of our business for the last 15-20 years,” Bracewell said. “The heyday of that business was during Covid.”

Southside Market & Barbeque products stocked on retailers’ shelves are all marketed under the Southside Market & Barbeque label, Bracewell said.

Southside Market & Barbeque’s roster of private-label clients also has expanded.

“We do private-label as well for other small businesses similar to ours,” Bracewell said. “It has been a growing part of our business.  As the dynamics of dealing with the H-E-Bs and Walmarts has gotten more complicated, some of those legacy brands have chosen to outsource their production. We’ve also gotten strategic around some partnerships, partnering with other brands.”

Those efforts include partnering with brands looking to offer an authentic Texas barbecue product under their own label.

“Snake River Farms is one of our partners,” he said. “We smoke American Waygu for them on the same pits that we use for ourselves, with the same process. It’s just really simple. The ingredient statements are beautiful -- beef brisket, salt, pepper – that’s it. That’s the trend with all of our barbecue items. Barbecue has kind of turned into a commodity at the retail level. If we are looking for a customer and the first thing they talk about is ‘Yes, we want barbecue,’ but the next thing they talk about is price, that’s not a good fit for us. If they want barbecue and they want to talk quality and authenticity next, that can be a good fit for us.”

Signature sausage

Bracewell said the top-selling item for both the restaurant and retail sides of the business is their signature all-beef Elgin Hot Sausage. The sausage is course-ground and stuffed in a pork casing. It’s sold raw ready to cook and smoked ready to eat, Bracewell said.

“Our fresh beef sausage is the reason we’re still here today – that’s what put us on the map,” he said. “We’re in Texas, and in Texas people eat beef. It doesn’t matter what I put out there -- the beef sausage is going to be our No. 1 seller and brisket is going to be our No. 2 seller.”

Southside Market & Barbeque sources Goodstock by Nolan Ryan brand beef for its products from Nolan Ryan Beef. The Texas-raised Angus beef is harvested at a Cargill facility in Friona, Texas, Bracewell said. Southside Market & Barbeque sources beef trim for use in its product from the open market.  

Products are incentivized to sell in bulk to offer consumers the best deal, he said. “We have the smaller packages as kind of a test pack if they want to try out a new flavor.”