Bring it on!

Last year, Scott and I took the girls on a weekend trip for New Year's Eve.  The hotel staff kept telling us they were so busy as an excuse for their less than stellar service.  What the staff didn't realize was that telling us how busy they were, did not make us feel any better about our experience.  In fact, it made us feel like we had put them out.  I'm sure that was not their intention.  However, it reinforced an extremely important business mantra.  Treat your customer as if they are the ONLY customer. 

April and May are the busiest months of the year for CARSON wrappedhersheys.com.  And we love it!  We work extra hours on both evenings and weekends to make sure each order is processed and shipped when promised.  Associates in the phone center will not only answer calls, they will help production by counting foil sheets, wrapping 5oz bars and helping pack orders.  The marketing group will help enter customer information on the wrapper designs, proof and print wrappers. We really work as a team so our customer is happy with their purchase from us.

Even with all that is going on, the graphic designers are still working to enhance our wrapper collection.  We've recently completed designs for our Safety Campaign category as June is National Safety Month.  We are also creating wrappers for our Employee Anniversary and Employee Birthday categories.  Our customers keep giving us more to do and we are thrilled about it!

Hershey's for Heroism

On Memorial Day weekend Paul Swofford was awarded a Silver Star, the military's third-highest combat medal for gallantry in action.  Mr. Swofford was a pilot of the "Sweetest Rose of Texas," a B-24 bomber during World War II.  The Sweetest Rose of Texas was one of only four planes -- out of 35 -- that managed to return to the 445th Bomb Group's base after the Kassel, Germany mission on Sept. 27, 1944.

We received a very special request from Jan Sherwood to create a customized Hershey bar wrapper for the ceremony.  Paul and Sybil Swofford are her "adopted" grandparents and Jan was tasked with decorating for the small party after the award ceremony.  Afterward, she shared her experience with us, “I just knew I wanted something to 'wow' the invited guests and a special treat to remember this once in a lifetime occasion.  The candy bars were a huge hit!  Even the General that posted the award was really taken with the candy bars.” 

Birthday Party Surprise

Birthday is the name given to the particular date each year on which many people in many cultures celebrate the anniversary of their birth. It is often marked by a birthday party when gifts are given to the person celebrating the birthday. It is also customary to treat the person celebrating their birthday as “special” on this day, either generally acceding to their wishes, or subjecting them to a rite of transition.
It is thought the large-scale celebration of birthdays in Europe began with the cult of Mithras, which originated in Persia but was spread by soldiers throughout the Roman Empire. Such celebrations were uncommon previously so practices from other contexts such as the Saturnalia were adapted for birthdays. Because many Roman soldiers took to Mithraism, it had a wide distribution and influence throughout the empire until it was supplanted by Christianity.
Surprise parties are very common for birthdays. At most birthday surprise parties, guests arrive approximately one hour earlier than the honored person does. They assume hiding positions, and as the honored person walks in the front door, everyone emerges from their hiding positions yelling, "Surprise!"
For many surprise birthday parties, it is generally considered a good tactic to shock the honored person. Streamers, silly string, and balloons can be used to great effect. All evidence of a party, like decorations, should not be visible from the outside.

Here at CARSON wrappedhershey.com, we recently were asked by our customer Eyvonne M. to help her create a birthday wrapper for her Father’s 70th Birthday and surprise party!  Thanks so much for letting us take part in this special and fun occasion!

I just gave my dad a 70th Surprise Birthday Party and used your candy bars as the party favor at each seating.  Everyone went crazy over them.  They said they never saw anything like that and just LOVED them!!!  What a great product!!!  Thank you for the great service and quick turn-around time!! I will definitely refer this product to anyone having a special function!” -Eyvonne M.

Mysterious Origins

Weddings can be elaborate, expensive affairs; and some are so intricate they require the assistance of a hired planner to successfully orchestrate. But this has not always been the case. Let’s take a little journey back in time and peek in on a few earlier versions of nuptial practices and how some elements have evolved into modern traditions.

In early days, marriages had nothing at all to do with love. Rather, they were unions of necessity more than anything else. The largest tribe tended to be the most successful, so any measures that could be taken to increase the tribe were considered not only proper, but expected of any man worth his share of mammoth meat. In these situations the bride was often captured from a neighboring tribe and carried off. Being a decidedly risky operation, the groom needed the assistance of his friends to help battle off her enraged relatives. These same friends stood at his side during the marriage ritual, weapons at the ready to fend off any last minute rescue attempts. Hence, the tradition of the best man and ushers was born. This scenario also explains the practice of carrying the bride over the threshold, as proceedings thus far hardly sound agreeable. I don’t think we’d be going out on a limb by supposing the bridal coiffure to be in a state of marked disarray by the end of her wedding day.

After all of this tumult, the groom would usually disappear with his new bride for a while giving tempers time to cool and the situation to be accepted and more-or-less gotten over. This early “honeymoon” certainly looks quite a bit different than today’s trip to Niagara Falls.

Over time, barbarity gave way to civilization (to a certain extent) and marriage came to be viewed in terms of money, and political or social gain. Enter the arranged marriage. As women were pretty much considered property of the male head of the household, here is where the father giving away the bride comes into play.

In those days, it was BYOC (bring your own cake) or biscuit, really. These were typically heaped in a pile until the time was ripe for them to be grabbed by the celebrants, bitten into and the remainder hurled higgledy-piggledy at the happy fleeing couple. All the tasty morsels that fell to the ground were hurriedly scrambled after by young maids and rapidly devoured as this was seen as a measure of luck toward making a happy union for themselves. This eyebrow raising exercise thankfully evolved into the more flattering tradition of throwing the bridal bouquet. Another surprising result of this practice was the invention of the wedding cake. In the 1660’s a fastidious but unnamed French chef was appalled by the unsightly biscuit pile at a wedding and created the first multi-tiered wedding cake, single handedly installing one of the most well recognized icons of the modern wedding.

As mysterious and seemingly lost to time as the root cause of the feud between the Hatfields and the McCoys, traditional beginnings can come from unexpected sources. We here at CARSON wrappedhersheys.com have our foot firmly wedged in the door of new traditions by offering a wide array of personalized chocolate favors for all your wedding needs. While a comparatively new player on the scene, who can say how our contribution today will morph into tomorrow’s accepted yet inexplicable tradition? Only time will tell… 

ZZZ....zzz...zzz

CARSON recently shipped an order to Sleepy Eye, Minnesota, a city which is located in Brown County. The town was named after Chief Sleepy Eye who was known as a compassionate man with droopy eyelids. The Chief's real name was Ishtakhaba. There are around 3500 people who call Sleepy Eye home. The thing I like best about Sleepy Eye is the name. I love sleep. I don't seem to get much of it these days. It is weird to like something that you are not conscious for, but I do. There are so many good forms of sleep: sleeping after an extra long day at work; sleep after driving all night to get home; the first nights of sleep on a new mattress; the extra hour of sleep you get when you move the clocks back an hour from daylight savings time; an afternoon nap on a cold winter day; sleeping during the day after staying up all night writing a paper for school. On average, Americans are sleeping an hour less a night than they did twenty years ago. This is very troubling to me. Aside from the health risks, loss of production at work and increase in automobile accidents, being lost is the fun of sleep. The fun of waking up before your alarm clock beeps and knowing you can sleep more. The comfort of a favorite blanket. The warmth and fun of a water bed. I advise everyone to sleep more. Take a nap, sleep late on Sunday, enjoy a hammock. Whatever you do GET SOME SLEEP.

The Sunshine State

In May, I attended the Annual Conference for Catalog & Multichannel Merchants (ACCM) in Orlando, Florida. While I was looking forward to learning how other companies approach their marketing efforts, I was also excited for a mini-vacation and some SUNSHINE. Sharon & Scott were sweet to allow my husband to come along, so we stayed a few extra days and had a great trip together.

We were able to go to Disney World's Epcot Center and The Magic Kingdom thanks to a friend who now works at Coral Reef, the seafood restaurant in the park. After trying to squeeze in as many amusement rides as we could (Soarin' was my favorite), we had a nice dinner at our friend's restaurant, and she even seated us right next to the enormous aquarium filled with 85 different species of tropical fish. The food was great, and the dessert was even better. I ordered The Chocolate Wave, and as a very early birthday treat, they included a piece of edible chocolate with little drawings of fish and a "Happy Birthday" message written on it! It was served warm, with hot fudge drizzled on top and brandied cherries on the inside, adding some extra sweetness to the already rich chocolate. I'd like to think I have a second stomach just for dessert, so I ate every delicious bite. When you're the author of Chocolate Talk, you've got to do what you've got to do...

CARSON Bingo

When someone suggested the idea of Bingo throughout CARSON wrappedhershey.com , FunShine just had to jump on the opportunity.  Though this is not your normal game of Bingo, we took it a step further by adding our own personal touch. Instead of just using plain old numbers we dressed it up with some images of our mini products. There are 24 images of product and one free spot that sports the CARSON logo.  The chosen images were picked by everyone in the building. The images were displayed everyday on a calendar on our lovely new monitors placed throughout the building. As we were coming closer and closer to playing Bingo for an entire month we had our first winner.

As much as we wanted our winner to run throughout the building yelling "BINGO!", Sue excitedly displayed her winning card to everyone. I keep wondering how she managed to get so lucky with her card? Congratulations Sue!

We just started our second round of CARSON Bingo. Who will be the lucky winner this time around? Could Sue win two in a row?

I got your picture!

One of my responsibilities at work is to receive the pictures that our customers want to use on their personalized wrappers. Even though the process of receiving and saving every photograph is the same, this task never becomes boring because every picture tells you a different story.

The most popular pictures during this time of the year are for First Communion, Graduation, and Weddings.  It is wonderful to see the proud and happy expressions on the faces of people who are celebrating such important moments in their lives. Some of the best pictures are the newborn babies; they always give me a smile because they are full of tenderness. On a few occasions, I have received images of pets whose owners wanted them to be used on wrappers for occasions such as Halloween, Birthday Parties and Christmas…definitely something different!  And the truth is that every single picture is great.

However, I must say that my favorites are the Anniversary wrappers. These pictures are proof of a life full of love; and it is wonderful to see the faces of two people who 25 or 50 years ago started a life together, and are still living happily next to each other after such a long time.

Para ver Version en Español >>

Yo recibí tu foto!

Una de mis responsabilidades en mi trabajo es recibir las fotos que nuestros clientes desean poner en los chocolates personalizados. Aunque el proceso de recibir y colocar cada fotografía es el mismo, esta tarea nunca se torna aburrida porque cada imagen te cuenta una historia diferente. En esta época del año las fotos para Primera Comunión, Graduación y Boda son muy populares; es maravilloso poder ver los rostros de felicidad y orgullo de todas esas personas que están celebrando un momento tan especial es sus vidas. Las mejores fotos son las de bebés recién nacidos, estas fotos siempre me hacen sonreír porque están llenas de ternura. Y no sólo he recibido fotos de personas, también he recibido fotos de mascotas que sus dueños desean usar en chocolates para ocasiones tales como Halloween, Fiestas de Cumpleaños o Navidad… definitivamente algo diferente! Y la verdad es que todas las fotos son grandiosas, pero mis favoritas son las de aniversario de bodas. Estas fotos son la prueba de una vida llena de amor y es grandioso poder ver los rostros de dos personas que hace 25 o 50 años comenzaron una vida juntos y que después de tanto tiempo permanecen felizmente unidos. 

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It's Epidemic!

There’s a new epidemic going around. I’m going to call it “Carsonitis.” It is the inflammation of the desire to use CARSON candy bars for all of our family and friends special events and celebrations.

The latest victim: my mother. It started innocently enough last fall when she ordered, for the first time, special candy bars celebrating the autumn season for a church retreat.

Since winter isn’t much fun around these parts, she was safe until spring fever hit. As if on cue, Carsonitis flared up. A luncheon was held a couple weeks ago by the local YMCA Pioneers group, of which Mom and her husband Bill are members. She chose to make adaptations to a birthday bar, turning it into a springtime celebration bar. She put them in baskets on the luncheon tables.

Afterwards she told me, “Everyone loved the candy bars! They thought they were so pretty, and I enjoyed giving them! It was fun!”

Summer is just around the corner. My sister will be celebrating her new Master’s degree. I bet Carsonitis will strike again!

By Dianne Beeson

Carson Goes Green

On Monday, May 5th CARSON wrappedhersheys.com officially went Green! To do our part for a greener CARSON and a greener home here are a few facts/tips:

1.  Curbside Recycling/Labeled Bins: Now serving half of the U.S. population, these bins provide the most convenient means for households to recycle a variety of materials. The Big Five are: aluminum cans, glass bottles, paper, plastic and steel/tin cans.
2.  Electronics: Telephones, radios, televisions, computers and cell phones are items that have revolutionized our daily lifestyle. These items make up the bulk of electronics that pose a threat to the environment. So, next time you upgrade that cell phone, or get the latest video game system, think twice about what happens to the old gadget: 

•     Donate, remember old to you is new to someone else
•     Consider renting or leasing electronics, if you’re going to upgrade sooner than later, why waste money?
•     Buy green!

3.  Garage Garbage:  Did you know that used motor oil can be recycled? How about paint? It turns out that many of the items in your garage are recyclable! So claim your garbage back, learn what to do with the mess and help the planet while you’re at it!       

CARSON’s contribution:

Cardboard:  We recycle between 150-200 pounds of cardboard a day!  That’s 1,225 pounds a week and 9,100 pounds a year!
Cans & Bottles & Glass, Oh My! :  In our café we now have labeled containers for all of our empty delicious drink containers.
Ink:  We recycle all of our used ink cartridges!

By Jane Swensson

Special June Occasions

The pieces come together for our June birthdays!

Did June know?  It's anniversary time for...

Bang Birthday Bash

Every year on my birthday my friends and I get together. Usually we go to one of our normal hang out spots. However, this year I decided I wanted to go to Bang Nightclub , which is located in the Soap Box District  of Cincinnati. I just knew it would be a great place to just hang out, my friends weren't so sure about it. Friends of theirs had recently opened up AVS , an art gallery across the street, and had gone. So they figured it couldn't be that bad, besides it was  my birthday.

So finally we had a good group together, we reserved a table and a big party bus.  It was going to be a great night. Pam, a good friend of mine here at CARSON , who was going with, asked if I was going to design any wrappers for the event. I gave it a quick thought and decided to create a mini wrapper.  I was worried we wouldn't be able to take them in. So Pam, being the good friend that she is, put them under her arm and in we went. They looked so nice spread out all over the table. They were a nice conversation piece!

Although I had to convince some friends to go, looking back at pictures that night, everyone had an amazing time! When we left there were only three candy bars left!

By Kelley Fulmer