Candy and Me (23 page)
Authors: Hilary Liftin
Tags: #Biography & Autobiography, #General, #Art, #Popular Culture
Resources
Resources
Please stop by www.hilaryliftin.com and share your memories of favorite candies.
Online Stores
Candy Bouquet
www.candybouquet.com
The website for the franchise shows samples of sophisticated candy bouquets.
Candy Crate
www.candycrate.com
Candy bouquets of questionable taste (they come in ceramic planters shaped like Santa’s sleigh). But satisfaction is 100% guaranteed. Can’t argue with that.
Candy Direct
www.candydirect.com
An almost overwhelmingly large selection including Moofus Pops and huge candy necklaces (24 for $36.50).
Candy Warehouse
www.candywarehouse.com
Possibly the best site—the only one I’ve found that stocks old-fashioned marshmallow eggs. But the minimum order is $35, which spells trouble.
Groovy Candies
www.groovycandies.com
A personable site with hard-to-find candies from the ‘50s and ‘60s. Their sister superstore is www.discountcandy.com.
NostalgicCandy.com
www.nostalgiccandy.com
Great gift boxes by the decade. (Hint, hint.) Random: the Coca-Cola and Scooby-Doo collectibles sections.
Old Time Candy
www.oldtimecandy.com
A family-run business out of Ohio, specializing in the “memory business.” You can create your own assortment, but the best part is that their toll-free number is 1–866-WAX-LIPS.
Sweet Nostalgia
www.sweetnostalgia.com
An eclectic site where the nostalgia goes beyond candy into games and family reunions. They even have Wacky Wafers, although they are miniature and made in Canada.
Local Stores Mentioned in the Book
Ben and Bill’s Chocolate Emporium
Bar Harbor, Maine
www.benandbills.com
Peppermint ice cream year-round, fudge, and the only place I know that sells Meltaways. It’s too much heaven all in one place.
Door County Confectionery
Ephraim, Wisconsin
Some candy stores you never forget.
Dylan’s Candy Bar
New York, NY
www.dylanscandybar.com
With decor inspired by the board game Candyland, Dylan’s is well worth the trip to the Upper East Side. Down the translucent candy-filled stairs, there are candy nostalgia showcases. They do parties for kids (and grown-ups, one assumes), and will put together custom baskets. And if you’re on a diet, they sell candy-scented spa items. My only NYC Bottle Caps source.
Economy Candy
New York, NY
www.economycandy.com
A Lower East Side neighborhood candy store opened in 1937 with a loyal following. A trip back in time, with real discounts to match.
The Tuck-Shop
Oxford, Oxfordshire, UK
Haven’t been there since 1986. Can’t make any promises.
Candy Companies
Ferrara Pan Candy Company
www.ferrarapan.com
Complete history including photographs, and virtual tours of how their candies (including Atomic Fireballs and Lemonheads) are made.
Goetze Candy
www.goetzecandy.com
Caramel creams and everything else caramel. I like Goetze’s history timeline. Don’t bother with the explanation of why Cow Tales is spelled as such.
Hershey
www.hershey.com
News, interesting product profiles, and a convenient list of brand websites (www.hersheyskisses.com; www.twizzlers.com; www.reesesfastbreak.com; etc.). The Twizzlers site has some games. I guess I should clarify that I don’t play online games, but I appreciate the effort.
Jelly Belly Candy Company
www.jellybelly.com
A very complete site, even including a shop. A guaranteed source for the bestselling Harry Potter Bertie Botts Every Flavor Beans. I’ll take Green Apple, but Dirt? Not so much.
Mars
www.mmmars.com
Oddly, this site doesn’t have an index of product home pages so you have to dig around. Some are under the obvious domain names and some are not (www.snickers.com; www.milkywaybar.com). Some samples:
Snickers
www.snickers.com
A spunky site built around the “don’t let hunger happen to you” motto.
Skittles
www.skittles.com
A Mars site with a funky desert motif. One of the only sites I found with an active candy fan community.
Starburst
www.starburst.com
A kid-oriented Flash site.
Necco
www.necco.com
Learn their history going back to 1847. Fun facts about Necco Wafers and conversation hearts, and a small but intriguing store. (If I liked Clark Bars I would want that T-shirt, and the Mary Jane party coasters are adorable.)
Nestlé
www.nestle.com
This site is not highly informative for consumers, but does guide you to a few brand sites, including Wonka. The site www.wonka.com is cute for kids, with Shockwave games. Another Nestlé site, directed at retailers, has more facts about their candies (www.nestlenewbiz.com/products/confections/).
Smarties
www.smarties.com
The Smarties site was written by two fourteen-year-olds, Liz and Emily. It seems to have been their summer job. Some kids have all the luck.
Spangler Candy
www.spanglercandy.com
“Use Spangler Circus Peanuts to make a gelatin treat that everyone will love!” Um, need I say more?
Tootsie Roll Industries
www.tootsie.com
A cheery historical timeline and information about Junior Mints, Tootsie Rolls, Sugar Babies, Dots, and other Tootsie products. If anyone tries the Junior Mint Parfait recipe, I want to hear about it.
Find Out More About Candy
All Candy Expo
www.allcandyexpo.com
The All Candy Expo site often has live links to all the candy companies that are participating in the show, which is most of them.
Candy USA
www.candyusa.org
The National Confectioners’ Association’s consumer-oriented website. Candy stats and new candy releases are must-visits. Introducing Scorned Woman Chocolate Jalapeño fudge and Soft and Chewy Stinky Feet.
Chocolate and Cocoa.org
www.chocolateandcocoa.org
The consumer website for the Chocolate Manufacturers’ Association. Sister site to Candy USA, this one is all about chocolate. Learn how healthful chocolate is for you.
eCandy Marketplace
www.ecandy.com
Official site of the National Confectioners’ Association. Everything you don’t really need to know about the buying and selling of candy.
The Manufacturing Confectioner
www.gomc.com
Since 1921, the business magazine of the global sweet goods industry. I like the book list here, which contains such gems as
How to Salvage Rework Candy
. There’s also a thorough calendar of candy events.
Professional Candy Buyer
www.retailmerchandising.net/candy
The professional magazine for retail and wholesale buyers has critical special reports like “Chocolate Bars Rebound” and “Bubble Gum Report.”
Acknowledgments
I am grateful to all the folks at Free Press, most especially my brilliant editor Leslie “M&M’s” Meredith and her assistant Dorothy “Dots” Robinson. Lydia “Bull’s-Eye” Wills is a dream agent and friend, only sometimes in that order. Patrick “Sugar Babies” Barth risked dental catastrophe to perfect his superb illustrations.
I would like to thank several friends who read the manuscript and gave very wise feedback, much of which was integral to this book: Dylan “Fireballs” Schaffer, Kate “Peanut Butter Cups” Montgomery, Cindy “Skittles” Klein Roche, and Susan “Peppermint Pattie” Choi.
My deepest gratitude is and always will be to Chris “I Prefer Ice Cream” Harris, who helped plenty with the first two parts of the book, but gave me the ending.
About the Author
Hilary Liftin
grew up in Washington, D.C. A 1991 graduate of Yale University, she has worked in the publishing industry for a decade. She is the coauthor of
Dear Exile: The True Story of Two Friends Separated (for a Year) by an Ocean
, a book of letters she exchanged with a friend. She lives with her husband, Chris Harris, in Brooklyn, N.Y. and/or Los Angeles.
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