Sorry for the delay in posting this… the lack of net access at the hotel really messed me up….
So, Day Two at the show is over and done. Despite being amazingly sore and stiff (hauling around all that candy really uses muscles I didn’t know I had), I had a great time though. I met with a lot of great people from some great companies today. Mars, Goetze, CeCe, Au’Some Candies, Pure Fun, Pucker Powder, Candy ASAP, and Gumrunners are just a few. I was really losing steam by mid-afternoon though.
I stopped by the “Taste of Gourmet” part of the show today where they do wine/beer pairings and display some truly artisan chocolates. I tried the chocolate and beer pairings which were surprisingly good. They paired Cote d’Or chocolates with some Belgian(?) apple beer and raspberry beer. I’m not a beer drinker, but the beer really just tasted like strong fruit juice and when paired with the chocolate it was really good.
Dale Earnhardt, Jr. was at the show to promote his new affiliation with Palmer with the new Big Mo bar, but I didn’t go see him. Despite living in NC (“Nascar Country”) I couldn’t care less about seeing Dale. Maybe it will help them sell more candy though – I hope it does.
As for trends, it looks like the dark chocolate trend is still going strong. “Healthy” candy (or candy that’s not as bad for you) seems to be on the rise with even the big players like Mars coming out with 100-calorie portions and better-for-you candy (Generation Max). Another continuing trend is the move toward “utilitarian” candy – candy that gives you some benefit besides (and sometimes instead of) good taste. Candy, mints, and gum are all having things like caffeine, ginseng, and vitamins added to them.
Hershey has a new product called “Pacs” coming out under the IceBreakers brand and it’s a melt-in-your-mouth pack of sugar-free sweetener (xylitol), orange flavor, and vitmains A, C, E, and Zinc. I have a couple samples of them, but since xylitol does bad things to me, I’ll be sending them to one of the other staff writers to review.
