This past Sunday I got a chance to go to the Philly Candy Show which, oddly, is actually in Atlantic City, NJ - about 90 minutes from my house. While the event is definitely geared more towards manufacturers and candy retailers, there were a fair amount of manufacturers present giving out samples and literature of their new products. I talked to a number of them, and made sure to stop at every candy booth to see what they were offering.
One of the big things I noticed at the event is people are covering EVERYTHING in chocolate. If you can put it in chocolate, or put chocolate on it, it was probably there. There were gummi bears in milk chocolate and in white chocolate (”Polar Bears”), there was chocolate-covered potato chips, Bugles, pretzels, and marshmallows. A ton of booths that were offering chocolate-covered blueberries, strawberries, cranberries, and quite a large number offered cocoa beans and coffee beans coated in chocolate.
Another thing that I noticed in more than a few booths was “dusting” where a product is lightly dusted in a cocoa powder. If there’s anything chocolate needs on it, it’s more chocolate.
Another trend is the super-sized and realistically-shaped candy. No longer content with simply having gummi worms, we’ve now moved on to Gummi Rattlesnakes that must have been over 3 feet long, and as thick as your thumb. I also saw giant-sized Cola Bottle Gummis, a near life-size gummi rat and enormous gummi spiders. I had gummi toy soldiers, gummi lobsters, fake chocolate stones, and saw a gummi egg. There was a whole assortment of new products designed to look like other products!
Since this is an actual trade show, it isn’t open to the public, and for the most part, samples are meant to be eaten on the show floor so you can decide if you’d like to order the product. I still managed to walk away with a few samples that I’ll be eating and reviewing in the next few days, so keep your eyes peeled. They didn’t allow cameras (though I saw more than 1), so I have no photos of the actual event to share with you, except for the picture of my badge above - notice I’m listed as a buyer (wink, wink). They had no press passes so I had to fib to get in.
