Our Story
Star-Crossed Lovers
Liz's greatest love affair has always been with sugar. And Dan's greatest love affair has always been with Liz. And that is where their story begins. Two star-crossed lovers: high on chocolate, but down on their luck. After the dizzying days of dot-com highs and lows, the beleaguered couple was out of work, in debt, with unemployment benefits running out fast.
They daydreamed of moving to Vermont and starting a small business, but it seemed so distant. Meanwhile, and much to Dan's chagrin, Liz filled the freezer with vegan hand-dipped chocolate goodies for friends and family. The outcry was unanimous, “When can we place an order?”
Hey, We're a Cookie Business!
So, Liz locked herself up like Rapunzel in tiny attic-level kitchen in their Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania apartment. Most of the ceiling was on a deep slope, and she stopped counting after the 46th time she knocked her head. Despite cramped conditions, Liz yielded the best vegan cookie recipes of all time... she fooled friends, family, and staunch anti-vegetarians with ease.
They baked hundreds of samples, schmoozing everyone they could think of with free cookies. One fateful morning, they piled into their pickup around 5am with big boxes of cookies headed for the Whole Foods Market regional headquarters in Rockville, Maryland. They weren't actually invitied, so they left cookies with the receptionist and went home. Two weeks later, the phone rang and they were in! Soon, the fledgling cookie makers were shipping cookies all over the East Coast.
Schools Out for the Summer
The business had really taken off by Winter 2003. Cold weather kept the cookies from melting in transit. But summer was fast approaching. They needed temperature controlled distribution or they were done-for. In a curious stroke of both totally fantastic and utterly dismal luck, United Natural Foods, Inc. (the largest natural foods distributor in the US) agreed to take them on. But not until September... right after the summer! Exhausted from their non-stop schedule of baking and shipping cookies, were heart-broken. And at the same time, sort of relieved.
Liz and Dan were like patriots without a country that summer. The bakery was shut-down and packed away, and their legacy was fading daily. Plus, they knew that meeting their September deadline was a long-shot. They needed capital, a new bakery, more equipment... you name it! Miraculously, they found help in... of all places... VERMONT! So they packed everything into boxes and moved up North. They survived six-weeks of grueling bakery construction building walls, digging plumbing trenches, and installing equipment. Somehow, they finished just in time to deliver cookies for their September launch.
Green Mountain Paradise
Today, Liz and Dan are still working like crazy. But now their morning commute winds through rolling mountains and majestic fields into Vermont's Mad River Valley where they continue to build their dream together. No traffic lights. No traffic. Just farms, fields, cows, and beautiful skies. You should visit them sometime... it's paradise.
