Fooling Aunt Ester

EDITOR'S NOTE: We've added a few employees to our roster this summer and one of the things I've told each during training is, "get ready to hear some great stories!" Our customers are loyal, interesting and genuinely funny people who, more often than not, are great story-tellers. For this month's post I wanted to share an example. Jim Kellogg of Lake Barrington, IL recently stopped in our Barrington shop and related the following tale about how he tricked his dear Aunt Ester into becoming a fan of our chocolates. The following is written by Mr. Kellogg himself. I hope you enjoy his story as much as we did.

 



Jim Kellogg,
customer since about 1980

"My elderly Aunt Ester was very particular about what she purchased and where she purchased it from.

She would rather have a pair of socks from Marshall Fields than a mink coat from Sears.

Ester came over from England when she was 12 years old and worked as a cook/housekeeper for a family in Detroit until she retired to Winter Park, Florida.
 

 She loved chocolates but would only eat them if they were from Fannie May. 

When she visited us one year,  I drove up to Richmond and bought a box of chocolates from Anderson’s Candy Shop. Aunt Ester wouldn’t touch them.  She wouldn’t even try a single one.  

It irritated me.

So I waited until she had emptied her Fannie May box.  I put the Anderson’s Chocolates in the Fannie May box and gave it to her the next morning.

She ate every one of them over the next several days.

 

Aunt Ester

Then she asked me to take her to Fannie May to buy some more chocolate.

I dropped her at the door and parked the car.  As I walked in, she was loudly complaining to the woman behind the counter, “Where are the good chocolates?  Why don’t you have the good chocolates anymore?".

I had to confess to her that I had switched chocolates.

Afterward, as long as she lived, Ester would send me money to go to Richmond and buy 8 boxes of Anderson’s chocolates and ship them to her home in Florida so she could give her closest friends “the best chocolates” for Christmas. 

I never asked how many boxes actually got to her friends."

Thank you again, Jim, for sharing this great story. And as a reminder to our other friends and fans, we love to hear and share what you have to say, so shoot us an email with your story and pictures at andersonscandyshop@gmail.com!

Winning mom over - "seconds" and a lifetime of love

Editor's Note: I love a good love story. I also love hearing about how the candy my family has been making for four generations has played a part in our customers' lives. This blog combines both. The following is an excerpt from an email we received during Christmas time at the candy shop. It was written by long-time Anderson's customer Nancy Meyer to my father, Leif Anderson.

Meyer claims that her four adult sons owe "their very existence" to Anderson's Candy Shop. We found her message delightful and very touching. 

Because we enjoyed Meyer's tale, and because that most-romantic-of-holiday's is right around the corner, we thought you would enjoy Nancy's story, too.

Thank you Nancy, for sharing, and without further ado ... the words of Mrs. Meyer.


Aloha Mr Anderson. It was good speaking to you as I ordered candy for my 4 adult sons who owe their very existence to your shop.


As I related to you, my husband Charles Meyer was the son of Julia and Gerhard Meyer who owned the Meyer Tourist rooms at the south end of Richmond in the 1950's.

Young and in love - Nancy Mellor and Chuck Meyer.

Charles aka Chuck went away to college in Madison, Wisconsin and mutual friends introduced us.


At the time, I lived just outside of Madison and my mother was not particularly enthusiastic about my college boy suitor UNTIL after one fated trip home to Richmond when he returned with a gift for Mom.


It was a box of Anderson's Candy and the reaction was remarkable.


It melted all of Mom's resistance to Chuck.

Nancy's grandfather
Charles Johnson aka Dutch

Mom had memories of your establishment going back to her childhood in Chicago. Her father would borrow a friend's open top car and drive up to your business -- this would have been in the 20's as Mom was born in 1915.



Money was definitely not plentiful for them so my grandfather would buy bags full of "seconds" and take them back to Chicago to enjoy.


Mom had such good memories of those treks and the candy that all resistance to Chuck melted when she realized that he was the way to tap those childhood memories once again.

...

Chuck and I were married 47 years before he died in 2006.

Nancy Meyer and Charles Meyer - happily married.

We had four sons, the people who will receive the candy ordered today.


Throughout our life together Chuck and I lived mainly in Michigan but also in Belgium, France and Japan. But any visit back to the area would absolutely have to include a stocking-up stop at Anderson's.


We bought for ourselves and the sons all remember the time in your shop as fondly as they were each allowed to choose their own personal candy bars.


During each stop, we'd often tell the story of Mom and her "seconds" and ask the clerk if perhaps there were any second of any kind to be had that day.

Nancy's mother Betty Johnson Storie

On more than one occasion the clerk would quietly reach over and thump on a bar that would, of course, break, and say "yes, we have a second."


We would take Mom her second and she would enjoy her childhood memories once again.


Mom enjoyed her last second during the summer of 2004 and died the next year.

...

I do think the existence of your business was quite influential in lessening my Mom's resistance to the brash young college man I had taken a fancy to all those years ago, and therefore is part of the reason we were able to survive our courtship, marry and raise four sons who have their feet firmly planted in the Midwest no matter where else they might live.


Thanks for being part of our lives.


- Nancy Meyer

Nancy Meyer and her sons William (Bill), Steven (Steve), Scott, and Andrew (Andy).