Celebrate Spring and our Birthday!

Ah, spring! One of my favorite times of the year! More sunny hours of the day to enjoy bright, colorful, blooming flowers popping-up and lots of new pastel colored candies and yummy chocolate bunnies to indulge in. Oh, and did I mention our two-year birthday is coming up!


The girls and I are having so much fun getting into the spirit of spring. The shoppe is completely decked-out with flowers, edible bunnies, yummy Easter eggs and jelly beans of every assortment imaginable!


These past two years have been a hoot! To celebrate and to say thank you, we’ll be doing fun giveaways and offering sweet deals throughout the month of April. On Wednesdays, come on in and get our fabulous cupcakes for only $1.00 while supplies last. You won’t want to miss Fridays at the shoppe either – especially if you enjoy the thrill of winning drawings… we’ll be giving away lots of yummy things! And since April 9th is our actual birthday, the first 200 customers will receive a free cupcake on our special day.

When we opened the shoppe in April of 2009, our inventory of candies and chocolates was very large… more than 600 different varieties. Two years later, our inventory of yummy confections and chocolates is huge… more than 800 varieties to please every sweet tooth! Speaking of discerning palettes, the wait for dark chocolate melt-aways is over! Come on in and let us hook you up with a big bag of these popular, decadent treats!

We’ve received lots of great press in the past few months that has brought many new faces in the door – many of whom have become sweet regulars. We can’t thank you all enough for making each and every day a delight to “play” here.

Come on in and celebrate our birthday with us! We want to personally say thank you for all of your loyalty, friendship and support!

Sweetly yours,
Lola

What’s Not to Love! 2011 Valentine’s Day Guide of Sweet Treats for you and your Honey.

Romance isn’t dead. But it will be if you ignore your sweetie on the most romantic day of the year! Valentine’s Day – a day filled with candies, chocolates, cupcakes, hearts and kisses is just a few short weeks away so we’ve put together a few fun ways to spend this special day:

• Don’t want to go out? How about watching some classic love stories together at home, like Breakfast at Tiffany’s, Sleepless in Seattle, or my favorite, Casablanca. We have the perfect theatre candy (remember Flicks!) and the yummiest desserts in town to help make the evening complete.



• Can't get off of work on the 14th? If you can't take the day off, stop by the shoppe afterwards and pick-up some of our decadent hand-dipped chocolates to bring home for the evening.



• Looking for a sweeter alternative to roses? We have chocolate roses that are sure to melt your honey’s heart!



• Not sure how to express your feelings? Our Conversation Hearts are a time-honored tradition that is sure to help the love-struck, tongue-tied get their message across. Kiss Me! Yes! Be Mine!



• Feeling too old to celebrate Valentine’s Day? Bring your loved one into Lola’s Sugar Rush for a fun trip down memory lane. We have all the candies you loved as a child, plus everyone’s a kid in our candy shoppe!

What’s that? You don’t have a honey to spend this special day with? No problem! We can put “The Perfect Man” or the “Boyfriend” right in the palms of your hands.

The Perfect Man we’re talking about is sweet and decadently rich… just how a man ought to be.

The Boyfriend is tall, buff and Belgian… totally yummy.

If either of these guys were any hotter, they’d melt!

And if they change their minds and split… you can chew them up in little bits!

These beautiful “hunks” of solid milk chocolate can’t help but bring a smile to your face!

Happy Valentine's Day from all of us, to all of you. Hope to see you soon sweet friends!

Sweetly yours,
Lola

Valentine Photographs taken by James Cromwell Holden
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Happy New Year!

Hello Friends,

Happy New Year from all the Sugar Babes here at Lola's Sugar Rush! Thank you for making this holiday season the sweetest ever! We had so much fun!

Sweet Highlights of the last few months in 2010

Parents and kids start new holiday tradition at Lola’s Sugar Rush: In November, we launched our gingerbread house workshops on Sunday afternoons. It was so awesome to see children and adults enjoying their time together as they started a new family tradition. I even got my family in on the fun! In fact, we had so much fun together, we put the finished products (three houses) front and center on our holiday table! I knew it would be a fabulous idea to do the workshops but didn't expect the overwhelming response from our customers. Next year we will be adding even more sessions to accommodate all of our great customers.

Channel 7 A-List winners again! For the second straight year, Lola’s Sugar Rush was voted Best Gift Shop in Colorado. As I have always said, candy is one of the sweetest gifts you can give! Of course we also have non-food confectionary items such as our signature lotions, candles, bath products and apparel that are not only whimsical and fun, they’re calorie free! We look forward to another year of meeting new friends and exceeding your customer service expectations to give you the best ideas for your gift giving needs.

Corporate candy gift baskets flew off the shelves! The Sugar Babes and I felt like Willie Wonka’s Oompa Loompas feverishly creating pre-made and made to order candy baskets and boxes filled to the brim with fun nostalgic candies, gourmet chocolates, gummies and sours. If you are looking to do something fun and unique for your clients, be sure to keep us in mind.

Upcoming

February is the sweetest month of the year at Lola’s Sugar Rush! Ok, ok, every month is sweet at Lola’s Sugar Rush, but now that the season of love is upon us, we are fully stocked with all of your traditional Valentine favorites. We have even added a few new items that our sure to add some sweet-spice to your life!

Until Next Month, Stay Sweet!
Lola

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New Friends from Maryland!

Hi Friends,

I have to share a fun story from Lola’s Sugar Rush! The other day, this charming young couple walked into the Sugar Rush. Right away they said, Hi Lola! as if they’d known me forever. I did not recognize them, but I treat everyone who comes in the shoppe as if they are old friends, so of course, I greeted them with a sense of familiarity too.

Turns out, they had traveled all the way from Maryland just to see my nostalgic candy store!

According to the husband, he and his wife fell in love with pictures they saw online of Lola’s Sugar Rush and came all the way out to Colorado just to see my little candy store!

As many of you know, I have spent the last five years visiting the best candy stores around the world, and incorporating the very best of each into the creation Lola’s Sugar Rush.

I can’t tell you how thrilling it is to know the old-fashioned candy store I’ve created has now become a destination spot for candy aficionados like me!
It is sweet moments like meeting “my new friends from Maryland” that remind me every day that I am living the dream!

Thanks for all your sweet support!
Lola

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Sweet Jelly Belly Fun!

Every year, my daughter and I take a girls’ trip somewhere fun. This year, she and I decided to go west to the San Francisco Bay Area and its famous Jelly Belly Factory!

Like school girls, we both giggled when we drove-up Jelly Belly Lane and saw a Jelly Belly covered Volkswagen parked in front of the factory.


The inside was like a sugary Disneyland, with bright colors, a huge line for the factory tour, and oodles of people packed into the restaurant and store, eager to buy all things Jelly Belly!

The tours are offered seven days a week, except for holidays and we’re told more than a half-million people visit every year! Candy vendors like me are afforded a closer look. We received a private, behind-the-scene tour designed to give us an in-depth knowledge of these gourmet jelly beans!

Our very special visit included an up-close and personal tour on the factory floor, where we discovered bins filled with rainbows of brightly colored Jelly Belly Beans, huge machines, and Jelly Belly food scientists, making all the magic happen! It was like being in our own episode the Food Network’s Unwrapped!

Steam baths, sugar showers and a resting period mark the beginning of this magical process. After which, all the Jelly Bellies wind-up in an "engrossing pan," a copper dryer-like device, where they are flavored with syrup and coated with sugar. From there, each one goes on to be polished to a shine and emblazoned with the famous Jelly Belly logo.

The whole process takes 7-10 days and they churn 1.25 million Jelly Belly Beans a day!

In our hour-long tour, here are some other fun facts we learned:

*Jelly beans are one of the most popular candies in the world.
*Cherry is the #1 selling flavor.
*Buttered Popcorn is the most popular
*Pear (my personal favorite) is the 4th most popular.
*There are 50 official flavors.
*Each Jelly Belly bean has four calories and zero fat
*If a bean isn’t perfect it is called a Jelly Flop. Instead of going to waste, they’re sold at a discount at the Jelly Belly Factory shop. Misshapen or not, these colorful little treats are just as yummy as the ones sold for retail.

The sweetest part came at the end of our tour when our delightful guide gave us tons of samples. We are now true Jelly Belly fans!

To take a visual tour, shop on line and learn some more fun facts visit: www.jellybelly.com.

If you are ever in Fairfield, California, which is just north of San Francisco, this field trip is a must for candy lovers!

Speaking of road trips!
Some of you know that one of the many fun things we do at the Sugar Rush is throw birthday parties where the little ones decorate aprons, cupcakes, eat ice cream, pick out their favorite candy to take home and share lots of laughs and fun with their friends.

We recently got a call from a daycare/learning center full of too many tykes to transport to the shoppe. So we decided to take Lola’s Sugar Rush to them! Mary, the manager of the shoppe and I braced ourselves for a very harried experience. Turns out, the kids were an absolute delight and I think Mary and I had just as much fun as they did!

If you are looking for a unique birthday experience that your kids will remember for the rest of their lives, check out the details on our Parties page and give us a call. After all, the only thing better than being a kid in a candy store is being a kid in a candy store on your birthday, surrounded by all your buddies!

Sweetly yours,
Lola

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Sweet Talk

Summer is here! We are so excited to spend these warm, sweet days with all of you. Also, I just have to share some of the fun things that have happened in the last few weeks!

First... The Sweet and Snack Expo in Chicago was quite an experience. Mary and I laughed a lot, met new friends and now have decided Chicago is one of our favorite places to visit. Of course we tried tons of new sweets and found some old favorites that are coming back. Now we're working hard to get them into the shoppe for all of you to enjoy this summer.


If you happened to be flying American Airlines back in May, you might have caught our Lola's Sugar Rush mention in the American Airlines Inflight Magazine. We were picked as one of the places to visit for your favorite hard-to-find sweet treats. I can't tell you how many tourists have come to downtown Littleton and into the shoppe as a result of seeing this article! It is so exciting to see new friends wanting to take a small piece of Lola’s Sugar Rush back home with them. Our t-shirts, hats, and other signature items are flying out of the shoppe.

June has also proved to be the month to celebrate. We have had so many young friends celebrate their birthdays here with us. I truly believe that the birthdays celebrated here will be remembered forever. What child wouldn’t want to be surrounded by wall-to-wall candy, cupcakes and ice cream! Throw in arts and crafts, photos, and candy to-go and you have a celebration they will never forget.


As you know June is also the beginning of summer weddings. It is exciting to know so many of you are selecting to do candy buffets for your guests. Please keep us in mind during your planning. Our Sugar Babes would love to help you select your candy and share ideas to make the special day be even sweeter!

And always, please know you can connect with us on facebook and twitter to hear about all the new things happening at Lola’s Sugar Rush and in the candy world.

Sweetly yours,
Lola

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Summer fun in Downtown Littleton Colorado

Hello Sweet Friends!
Now that the snow has melted and the days are longer and warmer, you simply must discover all the fun things Lola's Sugar Rush has in store for the dog days of summer! The streets of Littleton come alive this time of year! Beautiful flower baskets lining the streets are in full bloom. The sidewalks are alive with festivals, music, merchants, families and good friends!

Spring proved to be very busy. Custom Easter gift baskets and candy flew out the doors throughout April. With the help of loyal customers, friends and family, we celebrated our 1-year birthday of Lola's Sugar Rush the first weeks of April. In May, we had an unexpected, but very special visit from Dr. Jill Biden, Vice President Joe Biden's wife. What a thrill to have her in our little sweet shoppe, only one year after opening our doors! (on your next trip in, find out what she bought!)

Now that I've filled you in on everything that has gone on in the last couple months, let me give you the skinny on all the fun things coming up here at the Sugar Rush and in downtown Littleton this summer. (for more details on events listed below, click on links)

May 6, 2010: "Ladies Only Sample Tour" Stroll through the historic downtown Littleton and experience all there is to offer from our merchants. Fabulous freebies will be given away from dozens of stores.

May 8, 2010: "Old Town Market ~ A Whimsical Artisan's Emporium." Walk, talk, dine, shop. Takes place every second Saturday, from May through August. Lola's Sugar Rush will be selling yummy $1 sundaes under our white tent during the May 8th Market. Don't miss!

July 15, 2010: "Treasure Hunt" Every third Thursday, beginning July 15th, look for and find the treasure chest "hidden" in plain sight at various businesses throughout downtown Littleton. The treasure is a cool gift basket filled with goods and certificates from many downtown Littleton merchants.

June 19, 2010: "Wild on Main Block Party" Don't miss this year's 6th annual all-day festival! The four blocks of Main Street will be closed off and the traffic will be replaced with food, music, dancing, games, displays, fireworks, and educational booths as the Littleton Community celebrates itself.

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