To sum up how The Buckeye Chocolate Company came to fruition, look no farther than the Hart family's love of good old Americana concession stands,…
To sum up how The Buckeye Chocolate Company came to fruition, look no farther than the Hart family’s love of good old Americana concession stands, their adventurous spirit and their wandering taste buds.
The Harts originally started out as veal farmers in Newbury Township, later dabbling in maple syrup production.
“We started selling the maple syrup at different festivals and events and at one of the events, my dad (Dennis Hart) bought a pack of cinnamon roasted nuts and just kept reordering it through the mail,” said Eric Hart, part owner of The Buckeye Chocolate Com-pany in Burton Township, which just opened a third location in Chardon and is celebrating 11 years in business. “He eventually bought a machine to sell it with the maple syrup. One thing led to another and he started to buy chocolate and fudge off of a couple different companies to add to his space to make it more profitable.”
The syrup and candy phased out and the nuts became more prominent. They were also going through a lot of chocolate and fudge, Eric said.
“Fast forward five years, we started running the numbers and (realized) if we open up a chocolate factory, we’re going to pay the bills just by supplying ourselves at these events,” he said.
And the rest is history. Though nailing down their name was a bit trickier than anticipated.
“The Great Lakes Chocolate Company is what we were going to name ourselves, but there was a hold on the name,” Eric explained. “(Then) I was at an event and I said, ‘We should just be called Buckeye Chocolates,’ and then my brother calls that night and says, ‘We should call ourselves Buckeye Chocolates.'”
Eric went online and discovered another hold on the name, however, this one just happened to be expiring in two days.
“So somebody had that name for 10 years and it expired in two days. So I’m waiting and waiting, watching the clock tick down I snagged it up and the rest is history,” he said with a laugh.
The company originally shored up 11 years ago in Newbury Industrial Park on Ravenna Road in Newbury Township. Roughly nine years after they began manufacturing their own products, the owners — which include Dennis, Eric, brothers Craig and Brian, and brother-in-law John Formanski — bought their current manufacturing plant at 15010 Berkshire Industrial Parkway in Burton Township.
Shortly after, they opened The Buckeye Chocolate Caf at 15065 Kinsman Road in Burton Township, near the company headquarters, with a full espresso bar and bakery.
“All of our mochas we make with real milk chocolate. We ladle them out of our melter,” Eric said, adding their baker is a woman who lives in the Middlefield area and makes everything at the cafe from scratch.
“We have fresh roasted nuts, sea salt caramels. We are trying to pair and introduce our chocolates and coffees together — sea salt caramels with a sea salt mocha, a toffee latte with a piece of old fashioned toffee chocolate bark,” Eric said. “Our place in Chardon is a little bigger. It’s going to be our best one. The first week so far has been great. Sales are great. They’re higher than we anticipated.”
The new Buckeye Chocolate Caf in Chardon opened Dec. 1 at 510 Water St. in the old Arabica Coffee House building. Like the Middlefield store, it includes a bakery and full espresso bar.
“I’ve always wanted to be in Chardon. The (Geauga County) Maple Festival was one of our first events,” Eric said.
He lives with his wife, Meghan, and four children — Mia, 5, Mckenzie, 7, Matthew, 11, and Makayla, 13 — in Claridon Township, so he often travels through Chardon.
“We’ve had a store in Newbury, we’ve had a store in Middlefield,” Eric said, adding if they were able to be successful there, they should do well in Chardon.
The main thing setting the Chardon caf apart from the other locations is its size as well as its offerings, Hart said.
“(We offer) salads, wraps, sandwiches, breakfast sandwiches,” he said, adding the produce they use for everything is coming from local sources, such as Great Lakes Growers and Middlefield Cheese House.
Alyssa Rizzo, who has worked for The Buckeye Chocolate Company for two years at the Burton Township store, is delighted to man the new station.
“I really like that I can be creative here. It’s not just a set (menu). I can try a new latte, I can try and make drinks better, do that kind of stuff with it,”?she said. “You can always improve, which I like.”
Samantha Leonetti, who also works at the Chardon cafe, echoed Rizzo.
“You can create a bunch of different drinks. There’s an art to it. There’s definitely an art to it. We do a lot of hand-made stuff, we do our hand-made pressed espresso, which everybody loves,” she said. “We use our chocolate with the mochas so it’s quality, which I?really like about that.”
She added, “Mochas are very popular, although the gingerbread chai at this time of year really sells a lot.”
When asked how the new cafe differed from Middlefield, Burton area for Rizzo personally, she laughed and said, “It’s crazy.”
“There’s such a difference in the people that come in. I like how everyone can sit down as opposed to just get their drink and get out. It’s a much more relaxed atmosphere and we’re also way busier than in Middlefield so that’s nice. It’s a shock, but it’s nice.”
The Buckeye Chocolate Company is one of three companies the Hart family currently owns — the other two being Nectar of the Vine, a wine and slushy bar, and Buckeye Concessions, a concession stand business.
“We do about 150 events a year,” Eric said of the chocolate company, adding he recently imposed a five-hour travel limit on all out-of-town events to keep things simpler.
When asked where he hopes to be in another five to 10 years, Eric said he’d like to open a “flagship” store in a big box plaza somewhere in Mentor, Solon or Aurora area, where they manufacture on site and have a more hands-on, speciality shop feel. ?
“I’ve been so open the past two years to opportunities that have been available. I’m not even close to where I’m going to be,”?he added with a smile.
The Chardon cafe is open Monday through Thursday, 6 a.m. to 8 p.m., Friday from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m., Saturday, from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. and on Sunday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. More information can be found on the Buckeye Chocolate Cafe Facebook page as well as at buckeyechocolate.com.
