Privacy policy

Last updated: November 1, 2026

The privacy of your data is a big deal to us. In this policy, we lay out what data we collect and why, how your data is handled, and your rights with respect to your data. We never sell your data: never have, never will.

• What we collect and why
• Google user data
• When we access or disclose your information
• Your rights with respect to your information
• How we secure your data
• Data retention
• Location of site and data
• Age
• Changes and questions

This policy applies to the SausageSoft website at www.sausagesoft.com and to the products SausageSoft builds and runs: the public store locators we operate for breweries and other food and beverage producers, often on a producer's own domain, and the Console, Insights, and Field Map tools that a producer's staff sign in to. We refer to them together as "SausageSoft" or "the services." We refer to site visitors, customers, and authorized users as "you."

Producers that use SausageSoft ("customers") give us business data, such as distributor sales exports, product catalogs, and store lists. We process that data on the customer's behalf and under the customer's instructions. If you have questions about data a producer provided to us, please contact that producer as well.

What we collect and why

Our guiding principle is to collect only what we need. Here's what that means in practice:

Identity and access

A producer's staff and SausageSoft staff sign in with Google. When you sign in, Google tells us your name and email address. We use your email address to check whether your account is authorized and which tools you can use. We store authorized email addresses and their roles so that access can be granted and removed. We do not receive your Google password.

If your email address is not authorized, we do not create a session for you.

Cookies and browser storage

We use a small number of first-party cookies, and none of them are for advertising:

• A signed session cookie keeps you signed in for up to 7 days.
• A sign-in hint cookie lets a store locator show a discreet "Sign in" link to staff.
• Staff tools set cookies that remember a previewed role or a chosen producer.

The services also keep a few preferences in your browser's local storage, such as light or dark mode, whether a menu is collapsed, and whether you allowed location access. That storage stays in your browser.

When our website, a platform page, or a store locator runs Google Analytics, Google may set its own cookies on that site to measure visits. We do not use those cookies for advertising.

You can block or delete cookies in your browser settings. The staff tools will not work without the session cookie.

Location on the store locator

To start the map near you, we look up an approximate city from your IP address, using the location information our hosting provider attaches to each request. We use it to center the map and do not store it.

If you tap the location button and your browser asks for permission, your precise location is used in your browser to move the map. It is not sent to our servers. Addresses you type into the location search are sent to Google to find the place on the map.

We do not offer the store locator in every region. We use the continent your hosting provider reports for your IP address to decide whether to show it.

Map and places

The store locator uses Google Maps. Your browser loads maps directly from Google, so Google receives your IP address and the usual browser information. Google's use of that information is covered by Google's privacy policy.

Customer business data

Customer sales files contain business information about distributors, stores, products, and deliveries. We treat them as confidential. We use them to publish which stores carry which products and to produce reports for the customer's own staff. The public store locator never shows per-delivery dates or unit counts.

Field records

A producer's staff use Field Map to keep records about the stores they sell to. These records are customer business data. We process them on the producer's behalf and under the producer's instructions:

• Store contacts. The name, job title, email addresses, and phone numbers of people who work at a store, such as a buyer or a manager. A producer's staff enter them or import them.
• Notes. A record of a visit, call, or text: what happened, the store contacts involved, and sometimes the name of another person spoken with. Each note records the staff member who wrote it and when.
• Shelf checks. Which products a staff member saw at a store, where in the store they saw them, and when.
• Photos. Photos a staff member attaches to a note. If the original photo carries the location and time it was taken, we store that location and time with the photo's record. The stored image itself has that information removed. Field Map does not ask your device for its location when you add a photo.

Field records are shown only to the producer's signed-in, authorized staff, and never on a public store locator. A producer's reports show which staff member recorded each note and shelf check, and when. If you are a store contact and want to know what a producer has recorded about you, please contact that producer. We will help them respond.

Website analytics

We use Google Analytics on the SausageSoft website and on our platform pages, such as the sign-in page. It measures visits and how people move through those pages. We use those reports only to understand and improve the website and the services. We do not use them for advertising, we do not sell them, and we do not share them with any third party other than Google, which processes them for us.

A producer's store locator may run Google Analytics under that producer's own analytics account. It measures visits and how people use the map, such as which product they choose, which store they open, and when they ask for directions. Those reports go to the producer.

Store locators also count, for each store and each day, how many times visitors open that store or ask for directions to it. These counts do not identify visitors, and producers see them in their reports.

Server logs

Our hosting provider records requests to the services, including IP address, browser type, and the page requested. We use those logs to keep the services running and secure.

The SausageSoft website

The SausageSoft website at www.sausagesoft.com describes our products. Visitors do not have accounts, and the website runs no advertising scripts. It uses Google Analytics, as described under "Website analytics." It also uses two first-party cookies:

• A path cookie remembers whether you chose the brewers section or the specialty food and beverage section, so that product pages show the matching example. It holds only that choice and lasts up to 180 days.
• A signed session cookie keeps authorized SausageSoft staff signed in to the website for up to 7 days. Signing in uses Google, as described under "Identity and access." Other visitors do not get a session cookie.

When you send us a message through the contact form on the website, we receive what you enter, such as your name, email address, company, and message. We treat it the same way as an email to sales@sausagesoft.com, as described under "Voluntary correspondence."

The brewers page and the specialty food and beverage page include live demo store locators. A demo store locator is one of our store locators, loaded inside the page, and it works as this policy describes for store locators: it uses Google Maps, it looks up an approximate city from your IP address, and it uses your precise location only in your browser and only if you allow it.

Our hosting provider records requests to the website, as described under "Server logs."

Voluntary correspondence

When you email SausageSoft with a question or to ask for help, we keep that correspondence, including your email address, so that we have a history to refer to if you contact us again. This includes email to sales@sausagesoft.com from the website. We use a sales inquiry to reply to you and to follow up on that conversation. We do not add you to a mailing list because you contacted us. Our email is hosted by Google Workspace.

Google user data

When you sign in with Google, SausageSoft requests only your basic profile: your name and email address. We use them only to sign you in and to decide which tools you can use. We do not use Google user data for advertising, we do not sell it, and we do not share it with anyone except as this policy describes.

SausageSoft's use and transfer of information received from Google APIs will adhere to the Google API Services User Data Policy, including the Limited Use requirements.

When we access or disclose your information

To provide the services you've requested. We use these kinds of third-party subprocessors to run the services:

• Cloud hosting and database providers run the services and store their data, files, and photos.
• Google provides sign-in, maps, place information, company email, and analytics for our website, our platform pages, and, where a producer enables it, a producer's store locator.
• A monitoring service checks that the services are up. It does not receive your personal data.

Each subprocessor may use your information only to provide its service to us. Customers can ask us for the current list of subprocessors by name at support@sausagesoft.com.

To serve a customer. A producer's authorized staff can see the data that belongs to that producer, including the list of that producer's staff accounts.

To help you, with your permission. No SausageSoft person looks at your content except for limited purposes. For example, an error may stop an automated process and require manual intervention to fix. If we need to access your content to help you with a support case, we will ask for your consent first.

Aggregated and de-identified data. We may aggregate or de-identify information collected through the services, and use it to improve the services.

When required under applicable law. SausageSoft is a U.S. business. Our policy is to not respond to government requests for user data unless we are compelled by legal process, or in limited emergency circumstances. If U.S. law enforcement has the necessary warrant, criminal subpoena, or court order, we must comply. It is our policy to notify affected users before we disclose data, unless we are legally prohibited from doing so, and except in some emergency cases.

Finally, if SausageSoft is acquired by or merges with another company, we'll notify you well before any of your personal information is transferred or becomes subject to a different privacy policy.

Your rights with respect to your information

We apply the same data rights to everyone, regardless of location. These include:

• Right to Know. You have the right to know what personal information is collected, used, shared, or sold. This policy lists what we collect and how we use it.
• Right of Access. You have the right to access the personal information we hold about you, and to get information about how it is shared, stored, secured, and processed.
• Right to Correction. You have the right to request correction of your personal information.
• Right to Erasure. You have the right to request, subject to certain limitations under applicable law, that your personal information be erased. If you are on a producer's staff, erasing your account ends your access to the staff tools.
• Right to Complain. You have the right to complain about our handling of your personal information to the appropriate supervisory authority.
• Right to Restrict Processing. You have the right to request restriction of how and why your personal information is used or processed, including opting out of sale. (Again: we never have and never will sell your personal data.)
• Right to Object. You have the right, in certain situations, to object to how or why your personal information is processed.
• Right to Portability. You have the right to receive the personal information we have about you and to transmit it to another party.
• Right to Non-Discrimination. We will not charge you differently or give you a lower level of service because you exercised your data privacy rights.

We may need to verify your identity before we respond to a request, for example by confirming your name and email address. Certain information may be exempt from such requests under applicable law. If you have questions about exercising these rights, please contact us at support@sausagesoft.com.

How we secure your data

All data is encrypted with TLS when it travels between our servers and your browser. Confidential customer data is stored privately and is only available to signed-in, authorized users. Access to staff tools is checked on every request, so removing someone's access takes effect right away.

Data retention

We keep your information for the time necessary for the purposes for which it is processed. That depends on why we collected it and on your choices, after which we may delete or aggregate it. We may also retain information as needed to comply with legal obligations, resolve disputes, and enforce our agreements.

Customer sales files are kept while the customer uses SausageSoft, because the delivery history is rebuilt from them. Staff account records are kept until the customer or SausageSoft removes that access. Field records are kept while the customer uses SausageSoft, including contacts the producer archives and notes and photos it removes, so that the producer's history stays complete.

Location of site and data

Our services are operated in the United States. If you are located outside the United States, please be aware that any information you provide to us will be transferred to and stored in the United States. By using the services or providing us with your personal information, you consent to this transfer.

Age

The services are not directed at children. Some store locators help people find alcoholic beverages, and those are not directed at anyone under the legal drinking age. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children.

Changes and questions

We may update this policy as needed to comply with relevant regulations and to reflect new practices. Whenever we make a significant change, we will refresh the date at the top of this page.

Have any questions, comments, or concerns about this privacy policy, your data, or your rights with respect to your information? Please email us at support@sausagesoft.com and we'll be happy to try to answer them.

Adapted from the Basecamp open-source policies / CC BY 4.0