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Community Corner

Marion's Chocolate Store Moves up the Street

New facility allows chocolate to be made on site

 

Marion’s chocolate store has a new location and name.

The , formerly Temptations Fine Chocolates, is now located at 1244 Seventh Ave., across the street from Walgreens.

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The new facility allows the owners to create the chocolate on site.  Before, the chocolate was being made at an Atkins production facility and then brought in to the retail store.

“By consolidating it, it is going to simplify it a lot,” said Gae Sharp-Richardson, who owns the facility with her husband, Deane Richardson.

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The best part for them is they get to interact with customers much more.

“Every day there’s something that makes us glad we did it,” said Deane Richardson.

His wife agreed.

“It’s interesting to hear the customers see the chocolates,” Sharp-Richardson said.  “To hear, ‘oh so beautiful’, it’s rewarding.”

Sharp-Richardson is an artist by trade who takes pride in not only having the chocolates taste good, but also look good. 

She decorates each one with a bit of colored chocolate on top, which also solves the dilemma of which kind is what.  Yellow equals lemon, pink strawberry, red cherry, green peppermint, orange is orange and purple and blue are raspberry.

She and her husband have been in the chocolate business for seven and a half years.  Temptations, however, has been a chocolate business in the area for more than 30 years.

As everyone refers to the store as the chocolate shop, the pair thought it only made sense to change the name when they moved to the new location.

Sharp-Richardson has made a lot of changes to the business that has led to its continual success.

The chocolates come in containers with a clear top allowing patrons to see exactly what kinds they are purchasing.  They are also decorated with bright ribbons.

The biggest rule of the store is everything is fresh.  If a chocolate doesn’t sell it doesn’t get made again. 

“We did a lot of cutting in the beginning,” Sharp-Richardson said.  “We only kept the good guys.”

The chocolate sells for $19.50 a pound.  The truffles are $2.50 each.

Best sellers include:  Sicilian salt dark chocolate, double dark truffle, and dark almond toffee.

In addition to walk-in traffic, the store does a number of corporate and specialty orders.

Kandi Allison, volunteer coordinator and administrator of Brucemore, a National Trust Historic Site in Cedar Rapids, had the store create 125 boxes of four piece truffles to give its volunteers in October. 

“Their chocolate is amazing,” Allison said.  “The volunteers loved it.”

As to the old chocolate store location, 1026 Seventh Ave., Sharp-Richardson has big plans for it, too.

The store Happenstance on Seventh will open there around Thanksgiving. 

“It will have recreated, revamped, reconstructed, recycled, reinvented and altered original art and clothing,” Sharp-Richardson said.

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