10 Latino-owned brands to add to your next shopping list

Tia Lupita Foods: A mother’s hot sauce that became a business

© Courtesy

For Mexican entrepreneur Hector Saldivar, the inspiration for his food business came straight from his mother’s kitchen. After moving to San Francisco, he missed the familiar flavors of home, particularly the homemade hot sauce his mother, affectionately known as Tia Lupita, had perfected over the years.

She began sending bottles from Mexico, and soon his friends wanted some, too. Recognizing that the family recipe deserved a larger audience, Saldivar founded Tia Lupita Foods in 2016, according to the company, naming the brand in his mother’s honor. The brand is now part of Vilore Foods. Today, the company offers hot sauces, Mexican chili crunch, grain-free cactus tortilla chips, and other Mexican-inspired products that bring a little extra flavor to everyday meals.

• Add to your list: The Four Bottle Variety Pack to sample several hot sauces, or the Mexican Chili Crunch Variety Pack, perfect for tacos, eggs, and avocado toast.
• Where to buy: Tia Lupita Foods

CHUZA: Bringing Mexican street snacks to your pantry

© Courtesy

Growing up in Monterrey, Mexico, Daniel Schwarz was surrounded by the sweet, spicy, and tangy flavors that make Mexican snacks so irresistible. After moving to the United States, he noticed that the chile-seasoned dried fruits he loved weren’t as easy to find.

That craving eventually inspired CHUZA, a snack brand that recreates those familiar combinations with a modern twist.
Its colorful lineup includes dried mango, pineapple, papaya, strawberries, and even cactus, most featuring Mexican-inspired chile seasonings. For anyone who loves a little heat with their sweets, these snacks are an easy addition to the pantry.

• Add to your list: Dried Mango with Chili-Seasoning, or the Fruit Bundle if you want to try several flavors.
• Where to buy: CHUZA

Loisa: Bringing Caribbean Latin traditions into the modern kitchen

© Courtesy

For longtime friends Kenneth Luna, who is Dominican and Peruvian-American, and Scott Hattis, whose wife is Dominican American, starting families prompted an important question: How could they pass down their families’ Dominican culinary heritage while feeling good about the ingredients they were using? 

The pair launched Loisa in New York, creating organic versions of two essentials found in many Latin kitchens: sazón and adobo. In 2021, Dominican chef and food educator Yadira Garcia joined as an owner, helping develop the brand’s sofrito from a recipe inspired by her family’s cooking traditions.

The company is named in tribute to Loisaida, the longtime nickname for Manhattan’s Lower East Side, and it celebrates the Caribbean Latin flavors that connect generations around the dinner table.

• Add to your list: The Sazón & Adobo Combo, or the Flavor Trio Combo, which also includes sofrito.
• Where to buy: Loisa and Amazon, Target, Whole Foods, Publix, Wegmans and more

Chifles: A Cuban American family’s plantain chip comeback

Few snacks are as beloved in South Florida as the plantain chip, and for the Rivas family, Chifles has always been a family affair. Tony Rivas Sr. came to the United States from Cuba at 14 and went on to spend decades distributing Chifles to grocers, eventually becoming the brand’s largest distributor in Florida.

Chifles itself dates to 1963, when founders Segundo and Peggy Argudo started making plantain chips in Tampa, inspired by the crisps sold by street vendors in Latin America. In 2017, Rivas Sr. and his son, Tony Rivas Jr., bought the company from its founders.

Just four months later, a fire burned the Tampa factory to the ground and nearly put the company out of business. The family kept the brand alive and rebuilt it in Miami. Today, Chifles calls itself America’s No. 1 plantain chip brand.

• Add to your list: Original Salted Plantain Chips for the classic crunch, or Sweet Plantain Chips for a naturally sweeter bite.
• Where to buy: Chifles and major retailers nationwide

Pisqueya: Preserving a Dominican family’s culinary legacy

© Pisqueya: Preserving a Dominican family’s culinary legacy

For Maritza Abreu, food has always been about family, community, and the traditions passed down through generations. Abreu was raised in New York by Dominican parents and spent much of her childhood at the family’s Brooklyn restaurant, now known as Puerto Viejo. There she learned how food could bring people together while keeping cultural traditions alive.

In 2011, a fire destroyed the restaurant. Neighbors and customers rallied to help the family rebuild, and that support helped inspire what would become Pisqueya. Abreu left her corporate career to create a line of sauces and seasonings rooted in her Dominican heritage.

Today, the brand offers hot sauces made with Caribbean ingredients such as Scotch bonnet peppers, passion fruit, and pink guava, alongside traditional seasonings like sazón and adobo.

• Add to your list: Passion Fruit Hot Sauce, or Original Scotch Bonnet for a Caribbean-inspired kick.
• Where to buy: Pisqueya

De La Calle: A traditional Mexican drink with a modern twist

© Courtesy

De La Calle is built on a drink deeply rooted in Mexican culture: tepache. Traditionally made from fermented pineapple, tepache has long been sold by street vendors across Mexico. Co-founder Alex Matthews first tried it at a market in Mexico City and became determined to share it more widely. He then met Rafael Martín del Campo, a third-generation tepache maker who grew up learning the recipe from his grandmother and went on to study culinary arts and food science.

Together, they created De La Calle, a line of canned tepache that pairs familiar Mexican ingredients with unexpected flavor combinations. The brand launched in 2021. From Spiced Pineapple to Mango Chili and Prickly Pear, the brand offers a refreshing alternative to traditional soft drinks while celebrating a part of Mexico’s culinary heritage.

• Add to your list: Spiced Pineapple, or a variety pack to sample different flavors.
• Where to buy: De La Calle

Fillo’s: Two brothers bringing their father’s Cuban recipes to the table

© Courtesy

Sometimes the simplest family meals leave the strongest memories. For brothers Daniel and Antonio Caballero, growing up meant gathering around the table for beans seasoned with sofrito, a flavorful blend of vegetables, herbs, and spices.

Their father, nicknamed Fillo, had grown up enjoying those dishes in Cuba and passed the tradition along to his sons.
Years later, the brothers realized they could make these familiar foods easier for busy families to enjoy without losing the flavors that made them special. That idea became Fillo’s, a brand specializing in convenient, ready-to-eat beans and other Latin American pantry staples.

Its lineup includes Cuban Black Beans Sofrito, Puerto Rican Pink Beans Sofrito, and Mexican Mayocoba Sofrito, bringing several Latin culinary traditions together in one collection.

• Add to your list: Cuban Black Beans Sofrito, or the Todos Los Beans variety pack for easy weeknight meals.
• Where to buy: Fillo’s and Amazon. Check current availability before ordering.

Yerba Madre: Sharing an Argentine tradition, one sip at a time

© Courtesy

In Argentina, yerba mate is more than a drink. It's a daily ritual, shared among friends and family from a single gourd. When Alex Pryor left his native Argentina to study food science at California's Cal Poly University, he brought that tradition with him.

In 1996, Pryor introduced yerba mate to David Karr, a Californian who would soon become his best friend. The two bonded over the drink's energizing qualities and its deep cultural roots, and they set out to build a business that could be a force for good. That company became Guayakí, one of the first brands to bring yerba mate to North American shoppers.
Nearly three decades later, the privately held company changed its name to Yerba Madre, meaning "Mother Herb." Its lineup includes canned sparkling and brewed yerba mate as well as traditional loose leaf.

• Add to your list: The Best Sellers Variety Pack to try favorites like Enlighten Mint and Lemon Elation, or Loose Leaf for brewing mate the traditional way.
• Where to buy: Yerba Madre and grocery retailers

SOMOS: Bringing real Mexican food to American pantries

© Courtesy

For Miguel Leal, the inspiration behind SOMOS goes back to his grandmother's kitchen in Mexico. Leal grew up in Monterrey, and he remembers his grandmother buying fresh tortillas and beans every day and turning them into delicious homemade meals.

After a long career at major food companies, including Frito-Lay, Cholula, and KIND Snacks, Leal kept running into the same question: Why did Mexican food on American shelves have to be cheap and full of fillers? He teamed up with KIND founder Daniel Lubetzky and former KIND product innovation lead Rodrigo Zuloaga. All three were born and raised in Mexico, and in 2021 they launched SOMOS, a brand built on the food they grew up eating.

The name means "we are" in Spanish and reflects the founders' goal of bringing Mexican and American cultures together. The company uses traditional techniques such as fire-roasting vegetables for its salsas and slow-cooking its beans. Its lineup includes ready-to-eat rice and beans, simmer sauces, salsas, and Mexican chili crisp.

• Add to your list: Al Pastor Taco Simmer Sauce for an easy taco night, or the Mexican Chili Crisp Variety Pack to add crunch and heat to eggs, rice, and more.
• Where to buy: SOMOS, Whole Foods Market, and Target

Dolcezza Gelato: A love story served by the pint

© Courtesy

Violeta Edelman, a TV producer from Buenos Aires, met Robb Duncan at a conference in the Amazon rainforest. On their first night together in Argentina, they walked to a neighborhood gelateria, and Robb, a software engineer, suggested they make gelato in the U.S. Jokingly Violeta thought he was a "gringo loco."

After Argentina's economy collapsed in 2001, they moved to the U.S. In 2004 they opened a 300-square-foot shop in Georgetown. Violeta's mother took a gelato-making course in Argentina and flew to Washington to help. When the building couldn't power their Argentine machine, they ran it on a generator.

Today Dolcezza sells pints in grocery stores nationwide, and many flavors are made with dulce de leche. "We're still a family business, built on love," Violeta says.

• Add to your list: Coconut with Dulce de Leche, Dulce de Leche & Cookies, Swiss Chocolate and Banana Split.
• Where to buy: Dolcezza Gelato, Whole Foods, Instacart, nationwide shipping through Goldbelly, and Dolcezza's shops in the D.C. area.