Can You Say That? We have a popular and fun chocolate item in our stores and on our website that no one, including myself, really knows how to pronounce. It is the nonpareil. I’ll add the pronunciation here, mostly for my own benefit, taken from Merriam-Webster, so we can all be on the same page: ˌnän-pə-ˈrel. Or in…
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I’ve joked over the years that we need to have a Valentine’s Day every month of the year. It would be good for business to have what we call a “chocolate holiday” on a regular basis. Or at least, I say, let’s throw one in every now and then, maybe in September. I realize it…
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Standing behind the counter helping customers at our chocolate store gives me a laboratory to watch human behavior. Any retailer will tell you the same. The public parades before us. I see couples newly in love. I see parents exhausted from a family vacation. I can tell if a customer is a chocolate connoisseur or…
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A Little History, Not So Much Chocolate Advent wasn’t always associated with little bites of chocolate hidden behind paper windows or inside cute fabric pockets. Advent itself has been observed since the 4th century, celebrating the weeks leading up to the anniversary of the birth of Christ. Historically, Christians marked their doors with chalk, wiping away…
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Finding the Perfect Gift I love the holidays. I love the music, the lights, and the kindness that often accompanies the season. I love the decorations, the ribbons, and the cheer. And though I’m not much of a shopper in other times of year, I do love holiday shopping. I often start in the summer…
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You’ve heard this one, I bet: Being a business owner is great – you can work any eighty hours a week you want. Like all jokes, there’s truth to it. In the height of the winter holidays, for example, Dean and I can easily go weeks without a day off. Getting home for dinner by…
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We know, you don’t want to hear or see anything about the holidays in summer. Even seeing decorations in the big box stores in October is too early. We completely get that, and we couldn’t agree more. But there are some reasons to start thinking about ordering holiday chocolates soon that are both helpful to…
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Maine has great summers, and Maine has great chocolate (see why here.). But if you add chocolate and summer together, with temperatures reaching the 80s and 90s even in Maine, you may, if you’re not careful, end up with a less-than-ideal mess of melted sweetness. Temperatures Across the US For eight or more months of…
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When I try to find words of meaning, and struggle with what to say that’s not be said before, I almost always hold back, rationalizing it’s pointless to add my voice to the mix when I don’t have anything original to say. There are already so many voices out there with more weight than mine,…
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My dad usually got a “Happy Father’s Day” shout from us kids, either in person when we lived under the same roof, or on the phone, after we had moved away. When we were together, maybe we mustered a gift of golf balls or a new spatula for the grill, but usually he got the…
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