Retail Watchers

The Fairfield, California based company Jelly Belly and the Jelly Belly Factory has been sold to Chicago based Ferrara Candy Company.

Jelly Belly has been owned by the same family for six generations. The Jelly Belly Factory is a local tourist attraction.

Ferrara claims that employees should not worry about their jobs.

https://sfist.com/2023/10/19/jelly-bell ... y-company/

Ferrara has good leadership, in my understanding... This may be a good fit.

I know they are part of Italy’s Ferrero, which has bought Blue Bunny ice cream and Keebler cookies in recent years, along with Nestle’s US candy business.

Ferrara's Forest Park, IL factory has been in the same location for decades and is still cranking out candies. To me, keeping a manufacturing facility located in a high-cost urban area like Chicago (Forest Park is an inner-ring suburb) says a lot about the company.

Jelly Belly has some beans made in Thailand the past few years. Jelly Belly previously closed a plant/visitor's center in the midwest maybe it was in WI? Those beans from Thailand do not have the same texture or consistency as the US made ones. The flavors are there, but the texture is different. Jelly Belly is one of the highest priced fruit/sugar candies in the market, most of the Ferrera brands in that fruit/sugar candy space are few lower dollar type of brands. It will be interesting to see where this goes.

Ferrera has higher cost brands in the chocolate space. This should be a really good fit.

storewanderer wrote: ↑October 28th, 2023, 1:21 pm Jelly Belly previously closed a plant/visitor's center in the midwest maybe it was in WI?

That was in Pleasant Prairie, WI, just north of the IL border. There's some discussion on whether Kenosha is a Milwaukee or a Chicago suburb but I'm sorry to hear Jelly Belly left.

I don't see how shipping an inferior product from overseas helps the brand. Customers will get so upset at an inferior tasting product that you will lose those customers for life.

Saving a few cents with off shoring is not a good investment if you destroy the perception of the brand.