Monte’s Fine Foods might be known for its tomato sauce, but behind the label is a brand steeped in family legacy, creative crossovers, and cultural cachet. We sat down with founder PJ Monte to talk about world-building, Italian heritage, and taking red sauce from grocery shelves to fashion collabs and beyond.
PJ Monte didn’t grow up dreaming about shelf-stable food products. His story begins in the restaurant kitchens of Montauk, the dining rooms of Brooklyn, and the nightclubs of downtown New York. While his brand Monte’s Fine Foods has earned national acclaim for its award-winning tomato sauce, its real power lies in how seamlessly it blends legacy with lifestyle, family history with fashion, and product with pop culture.
A third-generation Italian-American, PJ was raised in and around the food business. His great-grandparents’ restaurant, Monte’s Venetian Room, was a New York institution frequented by the likes of Frank Sinatra and James Cagney.
In the 1950s, the family took that legacy out east, opening the now-iconic Gurney’s Inn in Montauk. For PJ, childhood wasn’t just about home-cooked meals; it was about soaking in the rituals of hospitality, the theatre of dining, and the joy of entertaining.
“Growing up in the restaurant business, the main thing I learned was hard work,” he says. “Not just putting the customer first, but creating an environment that feels like home, or maybe the home that someone may have never had.”
That early education wasn’t just about food; it was about experience. “During my time growing up at Gurney’s, it was designed to feel like a vintage cruise ship,” he adds. “It incorporated the nostalgia of our family’s restaurant in Brooklyn, and all of those influences have played a major part in the physical iterations of Monte’s now and in the future. It’s about world-building, then creating a brand universe.”
Before PJ ever thought about bottling red sauce, he was deep in the creative trenches of New York City, designing brand identities, DJing parties, throwing art shows, and collaborating with fashion and music talent. It was a kind of informal design school – equal parts chaos and curation – that taught him how to build cultural relevance through aesthetics, storytelling and community.
“Being tasked with brand building in all different capacities, I drew on my experiences and skill sets to digest what was the inherent foundation of the brand, but explore where and how it could grow,” he says.
That experience shaped the way he thinks about brand building today, intuitively, visually, and above all, experientially. “It’s easy to make a logo or compelling content,” he says. “But making sure it’s true to the brand from a surface level, as well as an experiential level, is what separates a true brand from something contrived.”
Fittingly, the spark to start Monte’s Fine Foods came over a veal parmesan. PJ had been helping out with his family’s new Hudson Valley restaurant when he was pulled into the kitchen and reunited with the original Monte’s sauce recipe (one that had been passed down for generations).
“It was that evening when I revisited the family’s sauce recipe and fell back in love with our legacy,” he recalls. “I had the lightbulb moment to apply all of my skill sets to preserve the story that always meant so much to me.”
That lightbulb moment became a full-blown brand. Monte launched Monte’s Fine Foods with one classic tomato sauce, with no gimmicks or unnecessary additives, just heritage, quality, and a design-led presentation. Today, the range has expanded to three core flavours (including a sweet and a spicy variation) and is stocked in over 500 stores across the US.
However, PJ isn’t stopping at sauce. He’s building a brand platform that lives far beyond the pantry. “I knew from observing the space over time that most brands were quite one-dimensional,” he says. “They were either based on heritage or trying to innovate. I knew I could create a brand that straddled both.”
Monte’s doesn’t play the nostalgia card too heavily, nor does it chase trends. Instead, it sits confidently in the space between, rooted in tradition but styled for now. The branding is sharp and elevated but also playful and irreverent, while the tone of voice is confident without being too cool for comfort. Its social presence is also distinctly, unmistakably Monte’s.
“I typically dislike the term’ lifestyle brand’ because I feel it’s used too liberally,” PJ admits. “But I believe we have truly encompassed what a lifestyle brand is supposed to be.”
The same ethos applies to Monte’s merchandise, which has been part of the brand’s identity since day one. What started with logo-heavy tees and hats has evolved into something more akin to capsule fashion drops.
“We’re not just a brand that makes dad hats and tee shirts,” he says. “We maintain the same level of quality and innovation with our merchandise as we do with our sauce and pasta—as well as a high fashion brand.”
Monte’s has been ahead of the curve when it comes to food-meets-fashion crossovers, thanks in no small part to PJ’s personal background in those spaces. He says, “Art is art, whether it’s creating a dish, designing a T-shirt, making a song, hosting a party, or running a business.
“It’s a state of mind that encourages exciting and unconventional approaches to any task at hand.”
The brand has partnered with Wanderlust Creamery on a burrata-based “Sunday Sundae” topped with tomato jam, collaborated with Sweet Chick on a chicken parm & parmesan waffle, and even teamed up with The Flower Shop in NYC to serve spaghetti pomodoro and mozzarella sticks with Monte’s sauce. And there’s much more to come.
“We’re leaning into unexpected menu placements that take our award-winning sauce beyond the grocery aisle,” he says. “Finding ways for Monte’s to show up in places where traditional CPG brands aren’t playing.”
Even Monte’s approach to social media is strategic but never stiff. “I love social media,” he says. “I don’t take phone numbers anymore; I take your handle. Don’t disappoint my feed; I promise you I won’t.”
Despite the cultural buzz, growing Monte’s hasn’t been without its challenges, especially without a deep-pocketed investor backing it. “The biggest challenge was preserving our quality and hitting shelves at a fair price point,” PJ admits. “But I love the hustle. Our challenges and struggles are what made us who we are, and I wouldn’t trade them for the world.”
Ask him what’s been most rewarding, and his answer is refreshingly grounded. “Keeping the family legacy alive, my way, and living the dream along the way.”
That balance between reverence and reinvention, discipline and spontaneity, is what gives Monte’s its edge. It’s more than a brand; it’s a creative practice disguised as a pantry staple, with PJ Monte as its chef, curator, and ringmaster all at once.
Looking ahead, the goal is to double down on creativity, quality, and culture. “Growing the core brand and leaning into the creative side of the business is what I’m most excited about,” he says. “More collabs, more high-end merch, and more ways for Monte’s to show up where other sauce brands wouldn’t even think to go.”
In the world of tomato sauce, that’s not just rare. It’s revolutionary.