Seasonal Candy

The Jelly Belly Candy Company, or simply Jelly Belly, is a maker of jelly beans and other candy. Formerly known as The Herman Goelitz Candy Company, Jelly Belly produces more than 34 million pounds of candy annually. more...

The company is based in Fairfield, California and has nearly 800,000 square feet of production space between its Fairfield and Pleasant Prairie, Wisconsin facilities.

Jelly Belly makes many varieties of naturally flavored jelly beans, including juicy pear, watermelon, root beer, cherry and buttered popcorn. The jelly beans were most famously endorsed by U.S. President Ronald Reagan, who kept a jar of them on his desk in the White House and on Air Force One, and who also made them the first jelly beans in outer space, sending them on the 1983 Challenger shuttle as a surprise for the astronauts.

History

David Klein (born in 1946) created the concept of a new kind of jelly bean that had not only a flavored shell, but a flavored jelly center. He engaged the Goelitz Candy Company to manufacture it, where candy manufacturer Marinus van Dam was employed at the time. Marinus van Dam was born in Ooltgensplaat, a township in Oostflakkee, Netherlands, on October 24, 1929. After obtaining a candy manufacturing degree in the Netherlands, he emigrated to the United States and soon went to work for the Herman Goelitz Candy Company. He rose to the level of vice president before moving on to other companies and finally starting his own business, Marich Confectionery.

When Marinus was asked how he developed the manufacturing of the Jelly Belly, he answered that most jelly beans at the time were cheap candy that had a 56% sugar content and were sold as penny candy. All jelly beans started out with plain, uncolored starch centers that were merely sweetened with sugar. Only the outer candy coating was colored and flavored. He wondered how he could bring this candy to the adult market, and his solution was to enhance the jelly beans so that they would appeal to everyone. The centers for the new jelly bean were colored and flavored with real fruit juices and natural flavors. This flavor enhancing process was also used on the outer candy shell. The finished Jelly Belly contained about half the sugar of the regular jelly bean, was more flavorful, and consequently healthier than the generic jelly beans sold in stores.

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