8 minute read

Quit Your Day Job: Andie’s Specialty Sweets

Find out how a husband-and-wife duo concocted a successful candy business from tools of their own invention.

Avatar image for Julie Schneider by Julie Schneider
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A candy-coated secret sits at the heart of Andie and Jason Moore’s business, Andie’s Specialty Sweets, in Dallas, Texas. It's the classified candy recipe that the couple uses to make their deluxe treats, including astonishingly realistic candy buttons and delicate edible feathers. They have spent years refining the recipe, which they keep under lock and key. They plan to pass it down through their immediate family, which includes five children between the ages of 5 and 18.

Before becoming a full-time candy maker, Andie had a varied art career. She worked as the art director for a snowboard manufacturer, airbrushed photo-realistic billboards for record stores on Sunset Blvd. and ran her own mural and decorative finishes business. She found a kindred artistic spirit in Jason, whom she met at a prep class for a Greek language course in Los Angeles. Soon after, they got married. When they started having children, Andie decided to stay home and focus on raising their family, while Jason ran a pool and spa maintenance company, drawing on his business school background.

In 2010, when their fourth child was a baby, Andie opened an Etsy shop on a whim during naptime. She started by listing edible daisy cake decorations, similar to the ones she made for her brother’s recent wedding, hoping to make some extra cash for Christmas gifts. Her appetite for candy-making increased, and she built her skills by voraciously reading books and experimenting endlessly. When her vintage-inspired candy buttons started getting press coverage, Andie set to work turning her hobby into a viable business. The demand continued to increase so steadily that Andie couldn’t manage the workload alone. A year-and-a-half after Andie started the online shop, Jason sold his company to join the business full-time. To grow in a more affordable location, they moved the family from Los Angeles County, California to Dallas, Texas, where they currently work from a 430 square foot workspace.

With more than 2,800 sales, Andie and Jason are at the cusp of scaling their business further. Andie Moore spoke to Seller Handbook editor Julie Schneider about finding her path in the food business.

edible-keys
Andie and Jason's inventive approach has landed them opportunities, including a spot at the Martha Stewart Weddings bridal market.

How have you navigated the complexities of running a food business?

We started with a list of requirements we needed to meet to be a legal business, starting with our state and then the nation, and just worked our way through it. Before we do any construction to our facility, we have to get the plans approved by the county health department. A valuable thing we learned: have all of these plans signed and pre-approved by the county health inspector. Another complexity is that everything we make is custom and everything is delicate. We invent everything right down to the packaging, which we have to get approved too. We’re not just thinking about safe travel for our products, we’re thinking about presentation.

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The husband-and-wife team makes candy with an old-fashioned spirit, inspired by a time when sweets were a rare treat.

What’s your advice for sellers starting out in this business?

It can get so much more complicated than this, but these are the basics: In the US, a food manager's license and a registered business are required to rent time in a federally inspected kitchen. You can rent just one hour per week from a shared kitchen, for around $40 a week, to get started. Purchase only packaging approved by the Food and Drug Administration. Seal your food items to protect them from airborne particles and water while in transit. Ingredients, allergen information and distribution information are also required by law on all food packaging.

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Andie and Jason made all the work tables in their clean white candy laboratory.

What is your biggest challenge?

We feel the tension of making a quality-driven, handmade product in an age of instant streaming and on-demand expectations. As we take strides to meet that demand, make adjustments and solve problems, we remember to never compromise the quality of our product. No matter how sophisticated and instant our society becomes, there is always a demand for those artisan skills that help sustain a culture. The more rare these skills are, the more valuable they become.

If you’re just trying to make more of something, you can lose the depth of it, the quality of it. It’s really easy to think you have to somehow lure everyone and every type of price point in, but if you focus on quality and mastering your craft, you’ll develop it into something that no one else is doing. People will pay for quality and for something they can’t get anywhere else.

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The California-raised couple find inspiration in the ocean, such as these vanilla-infused candy oyster shells.

How do you plan to scale your thriving business?

We’re at a point right now where our business really is dictating our life and we’re just trying to keep up. It’s just the two of us right now, and we’ve only expanded to the point of doing everything faster and better ourselves. We’re like human machines making everything. We’re working as long as we possibly can until we absolutely have to sleep. During a non-holiday-rush time, we start work by 4 or 5 a.m. and we try to cap everything off at 8 p.m. Sometimes we work all-nighters. We’re at a big hurdle and we’re feeling the growing pains. Many businesses go through this: They get to the point where they need people to help. We’re trying to hang in there as long as we can until we can actually take a leap, and regroup and bring in really quality people who can help us. Part of our next big step is to move into a larger facility and hire help to improve turnaround times. We have so many products in the storehouses of our minds that we’re excited to introduce.

qydj-buttons
Using natural ingredients is important to Andie and Jason. They hope to someday make all their colors from plant-based products.

How do you foster repeat business?

Our customer base is mainly a mixture of brides and people who are giving gifts, including people purchasing favors for events and bakers buying decorations for wedding cakes. We aim to provide service the way we would want to be treated. We try to make our customers feel like we’re the privileged ones to have them come to us — and we do feel that way. If there is ever a disappointment for our customers, it makes us genuinely disappointed. Our customers’ joy is our joy. We really care about the end result. We’re always making revisions and adjusting things to improve our packaging, taste and design. And, we do have a lot of repeat customers. We’re so thankful for that.

qydj-toadstool
Like a toadstool from a fairytale, the dome of this artful sweet is full of dark chocolate.

What do you love most about running your business?

It’s very rewarding to bring people joy through what we make. We love the pleasure that comes from creating. We still get giddy every time we make the toadstools. Our own sweets provide us constant cheer too. Our customers feed a lot of creativity into our work — a dynamic that we never anticipated. Often their purchase is the highlight or splurge of their event. That propels us to do things as excellently as possible, every step along the way. We feel like pioneers in an under-served niche. We're excited about how we're growing and where it will take us. For us, any success that comes our way is a blessing, and something we don’t take for granted. We have developed friendships with our customers and, really, they keep us going.

Avatar image for Julie Schneider Words by Julie Schneider

When Julie Schneider isn’t writing and editing, she’s carrying on her family’s pun tradition, making custom GIFs, or scheming in her cozy art studio. Keep up with her latest projects on Instagram.

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