Sweet Candy Company: Five Generations of Taffy, Cinnamon Bears and Orange Sticks in Salt Lake City

If you grew up in Utah, you probably have a Sweet’s memory. Maybe it’s a bag of cinnamon bears on a road trip, a chocolate orange stick tucked into a Christmas stocking, or a fistful of salt water taffy from a parade float.

All of that candy comes from one family, and they’ve been making it in Salt Lake City for more than 125 years.

A candy wagon in Portland

Leon Sweet founded the Sweet Candy Company in 1892 in Portland, Oregon, where he sold candy from a horse-drawn wagon. In 1900 he and his brother Arthur moved the business to Salt Lake City, drawn in part by the area’s sugar supply. The company was incorporated in Utah that same year.

The first Salt Lake factory was at 15 East 100 South downtown. Around 1910, the company moved into a four-story brick building at 224 South 200 West, and it made candy there for roughly 90 years. That building is now listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

The secret is in the whip

In the 1930s, Leon’s son Jack Sweet developed a method for whipping taffy with egg whites, which gives Sweet’s taffy its light, soft chew. It became the company’s signature, and Sweet’s has called itself the largest maker of salt water taffy in the United States.

Other classics followed. Chocolate-covered orange sticks arrived in the 1940s. Cinnamon bears, now a Utah staple, came along in the mid-1960s. Today the company makes around 250 different candies, from jelly beans and sours to taffy in more than 50 flavors.

Five generations at the candy kettle

Sweet’s describes itself as one of the oldest family-owned and operated candy companies in the country, with the third, fourth and fifth generations of the family all working in the business. Third-generation leader Tony Sweet, who became president in 1981 and later chairman, was inducted into the Candy Hall of Fame in 2006.

In 1999, the company left its historic downtown factory for a modern plant on Salt Lake City’s west side, near the airport. It now employs more than 200 people and ships candy across the U.S. and Canada.

Staying power runs in the family. “We’ve survived a couple of pandemics, the Great Depression and two World Wars,” Rachel Sweet told Salt Lake Magazine.

How to get your Sweet’s fix

• Order online. The company has ended its factory tours and store, so sweetcandy.com is the place to buy direct.
• Start with the classics. Salt water taffy, cinnamon bears and chocolate orange sticks are the Utah trifecta.
• Try a taffy mixer. With 50-plus flavors, a variety bag is the best way to find your favorite.
• Look for it in local stores. Sweet’s candy is sold in grocery stores and gift shops around the state.

Plenty of companies have come and gone since 1892. Sweet’s is still here, still family run, and still making the candy Utahns grew up on.

Explore more Salt Lake County stories and makers from around the state. And if you run a local business with a story worth telling, apply to be featured. It’s always free.

This spotlight draws on Sweet Candy Company’s own history, the Salt Lake Tribune, Salt Lake Magazine, the Candy Hall of Fame and the National Register of Historic Places. Top photo is illustrative: Lara604, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.