 As
seen in
Monday, June 19, 2006
By William R. Wood
bwood@kalamazoogazette.com
The Candy Man Can
CHICAGO -- He steps off the ascending escalator
looking like a salesman from a bygone era.
Rumpled cream-and-white seersucker suit. Navy
polka-dot bow tie. A black trunk peppered with the colorful
shipping stickers from a dozen foreign countries. This is J.
Brooks West III, 50, owner of Butterfields of Nashville, N.C.,
a candy company that makes hard candy in copper kettles.
On this Tuesday morning he comes to McCormick
Place in Chicago to tackle the All Candy Expo, the largest show
in North America focused solely on confections.
West has both business and fun on his mind. He
tries to blend the two together whenever he can. After all,
his business is selling candy that brings sweet joy to young
and old. West also sells the personality of a company that has
survived since 1924 without crazy gimmicks or fancy packaging.
Selling is his mission this day, his pleasure.
His worn, brown $400 Belgian loafers look soft
and comfortable as he settles his tattered leather briefcase
and trunk onto the floor, says hello and begins to talk as if
he's an old friend.
He smiles as he sees that his trunk catches your
attention -- it looks like something you might expect a clown
to carry into a circus.
``I call him George,'' he says as dark-suited,
pot-bellied executives stride past. He stands on top of the
trunk and grins as if amused by some inside joke. ``George goes
where I go, and we've been around the world together.''
His speech is slow and his gestures exaggerated,
like Johnny Depp's pirate character in the movie ``Pirates of
the Caribbean.'' He begins talking about his candy, the small,
hard candy with the luster and the single stripe that everyone
sees at one point or another around Christmas.
How does he compete with all that is modern, unusual
and eye-catching at the All Candy Expo? How does he distinguish
himself from the salesman pitching the 28-inch gummy snake with
the sour stinger or the salesman hawking the garter made out
of candy strings?
At the end of the day, flavor rules, he says.
Outstanding flavor is still hard to find.
``I'm at war with the mundane. That's my saying,
because I want to change somebody's day.''
A practiced line, to be sure, but he fills it
with grand exuberance. His lips curl in a faint smile that whispers
quiet confidence
``Stop by my booth when you get the chance,''
he says, picking up his briefcase and trunk to head off. ``It's
357 -- like the gun.''
Making an impression
West's booth is typical of many of the 440 booths
at the show. It doesn't have the hottest new products of the
expo, but business is steady.
A lot more attention is offered to Bubble Chocolate
Inc., of Medford, N.J., about 100 yards away, down the same
aisle. Even a TV crew from the Food Network visits Bubble Chocolate,
which makes a lightweight chocolate bar filled with air bubbles.
West benefits from his neighbors, Chocolate Impressions,
of Southfield and Custom Candy Concepts, of Ellijay, Ga. They
draw a crowd as staffers take photos of patrons, then transfer
the photos to a machine that prints the photos on chocolate-cookie
lollipops.
While other candy salesmen stand behind booths
and wait for people to come to them, West is out in the aisle,
shaking hands, patting backs, complimenting ladies.
West shares stories about how he came to learn
German and Arabic, and how he once climbed a tree and rode a
horse wearing the seersucker suit he has on. He takes time to
introduce some prospective clients to others.
At the front of West's booth sit mounds of vibrant
orange, grapefruit, lime, tangerine, peach and watermelon hard-candies
on cobalt-blue plates with rows of their decorated packages
behind them. An Oscar-like figure, a 1998 award from the National
Association of Specialty Food Trade for finalist for Outstanding
Confection, stands at the end of the side counter. The award
was for the company's Peach Buds.
West is especially proud of his newly developed
product. He took bits of leftover peach hard candy, which would
have normally been thrown away, combined them with white chocolate,
and called it Peach Bark. He has packages tucked at one end
of the trunk, next to a pack of Marlboros and some leftover
bubble wrap. He fishes some unmarked sample packages of the
Peach Bark out of George for a visitor to taste.
With such innovations, West successfully leads
his candy company. Even so, West says that he knows he's a disappointment
to his parents. They had wanted him to be governor of Virginia.
His family already has produced two Virginia governors, Alexander
Spottswood and Thomas West. When he was a boy, every couple
of years his parents would take him to the state capital and
have a picture of him taken in the governor's chair.
On his left hand, he flashes a gold ring the size
of a lug nut that bears his family crest.
His weary smile and his discussion of his background
make it obvious that the ring has been as much of a burden as
a boon.
Yet West has achieved success in resurrecting
the fame of a longtime candy company. He did it by returning
to traditional methods of making hard candy and by using retro
packaging, he says.
What's obvious is that he also turned the company
around by taking a personal approach to doing business. He responds
in Spanish to one Latina woman who approaches his booth and
addresses him in English with a heavy accent. His personal touch
is obvious as he puts matters of business aside to chat with
a client from Tokyo about his admiration of temples in Japan.
Then the inevitable happens -- theft. Inevitable
because the All Candy Expo, with so many salesmen giving out
free samples, encourages greed.
Two women in their 50s grab several packages of
strawberry, tangerine and grapefruit candies from the Butterfields
display table. West calls to them. He says the candy is for
display purposes only. One of the women looks back at West,
a shamed look on her face, falters nervously, then turns away.
She walks away faster. West gives chase.
But this candy salesman with the Southern drawl
isn't too serious about catching the women. He returns after
a half-minute. Clients and friends at the booth silently share
the embarrassment of the moment. Then West lets the sunshine
in.
``That shows you how damn good the stuff is,''
he says to laughter.
A higher calling
It is 30 minutes before the close of the expo
this Tuesday, and some business owners are covering the candy
on display at their booths. West is still trying to catch the
eye of the occasional passerby to share with them how his Peach
Buds fill the mouth with vivid, lingering flavor. But how was
business?
Most of the salesmen around him, he says, with
a sweep of his hand, come to exchange technology and see how
they can mutually benefit by selling products as cheaply as
possible to millions of people. That's the trend.
His approach is different. His 50-employee company
has found a market among the smaller specialty shops in tourist
areas and bus stops. Buyers who represent such businesses tend
to come to specialty food shows rather than candy expositions.
Visibility is what he's been after at the All
Candy Expo and reactions to some new packaging he is to display
the next day. If he sees five customers who place orders for
$600 each, he breaks even on what he paid for the booth -- and
on this day he cut deals with a few more than five, he says.
What means the most to him is when a customer
sends a message like the one he received recently: that his
candy gives her joy while she's going through difficult chemotherapy
treatments.
The lights in the expo center dim. He picks up
a harmonica that sits on the table of his booth next to his
trophy. He says he used to play in ``splow houses'' (after-hour
joints) when he was 14. That's one reason he knows about Kalamazoo,
the former home of the Gibson guitar.
He can't resist spinning another story.
``You know, I played my harmonica in the lobby
of my hotel last night. When I was finished, a guard said, `Play
another tune.'''
West grabs George and walks out of the exhibition
hall, back into a world where seersucker suits and bow ties,
handmade candy and a handshake that means something are fading
into history
©2006 Kalamazoo
© 2006 Michigan Live. All Rights Reserved.
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