When Tim Moran moved his family from Arizona to New Jersey in 2012, he and his wife took their three children to the Ocean City Boardwalk, where they tasted cotton candy for the first time. The kids loved the stuff.
Returning to their new home of Califon, in Hunterdon County, after that Ocean City visit, Moran relates, “We couldn’t find [cotton candy] anywhere, and what we could find was very poor quality; so we got a home machine and started making our own. This evolved into an effort to find the best ingredients.”
In the process, Moran, an entrepreneur with a background in commercial printing, began to see possibilities in gourmet cotton candy as a business specializing in hand-made products for children’s birthday parties, wedding showers and any other kind of event needing some promotional hook.
Last year, he launched SpinnCandy with a retail store in Hackettstown and later added a store in Chester. Two more stores are in the works, Moran says.
The primary ingredient in the fine, wispy threads is sugar. SpinnCandy is made with a high-quality baker’s refined sugar made by Domino. This, paired with high-quality flavorings, some of them natural, creates what Moran calls with a chuckle, “gourmet cotton candy.”
The biggest seller of his 30 varieties is blue raspberry, followed by creamsicle and marshmallow. Other flavors include lemon-lime, root beer, butterscotch, cinnamon and even merlot. Seasonal options include pumpkin, gingerbread and eggnog. The 2-ounce packages sell for $4 each. Buy four, get one free.
“People are fascinated by the concept of a cotton candy store,” he says. “We have racks and racks of cotton candy.”
Each package is hand spun by him or one of his six employees and sealed with as little air as possible to preserve freshness. The packages can be frozen without losing taste or texture.
Entering the colorful SpinnCandy stores feels a bit like going to an old-fashioned ice cream shop. The Hackettstown location is equipped with 15 small spinners to make kid-size portions for children’s birthday parties. The biggest part of the business involves shipping nearly 5000 packages all over the country each month.
“People are always looking for something different as a party favor,” Moran says. Each package can be personalized for birthdays, weddings, bar mitzvahs and sweet sixteen parties. SpinnCandy has delivered orders with custom flavors to corporate clients such as the luxury fashion house Prada and the Wyndham hotel chain.
7 Riverside Plaza (1892 Route 57)
Hackettstown
87 Main Street
Chester