Sweet Ouray offers a taste of nostalgia
Name a place in Ouray where you can get gummy sushi, a hat shaped like a crazed squirrel, a Jeep T-shirt, some Black Jack gum and a sweet treat with an arachnid inside.
“Where else are you going to get a scorpion sucker?” said Susan Yoder, holding up a yellow-tinged piece of candy with, yes, a dried scorpion preserved in its shiny sugar tomb.
Yoder, the manager of Sweet Ouray, helped pick out the inventory for Ouray’s newest candy shop, located at 460 Main St., next to the Wright Opera House.
Passersby can get a sense of the eclectic inventory as soon as they step in the front door. The rainbow array of shiny, sugary treats is both inviting and overwhelming, with everything from European chocolate to fake deer droppings made of chocolate, taffy and all sorts of licorice.
The store is the creation of store owner Marc Hitchcox, a local Realtor who also owns a T-shirt shop in Ouray with his wife, Kathy, and Yoder, who retired from the tech industry and serves on the Wright Opera House board with Hitchcox. The previous tenant of this space, Artisan Bakery, moved across the street into a bigger space, and the vacancy helped spark the idea for a candy store. Yoder and Hitchcox agreed in November to open the candy shop together, with Yoder managing the shop. She started working on the business back in February. Yoder, who moved to Ouray from Redstone in 2001, said she was ready for a new, different kind of challenge in operating a retail store.
The first step was to transform the space into a candy shop.
It’s clear the decor was all about nostalgia for Yoder. The black-and-white checked floor and the neon sign exude a kind of “Happy Days” vibe, and the rows of glistening jelly beans and brightly wrapped candies at kids’ eye level just makes it the kind of place families want to browse.
The candy shop opened Memorial Day weekend and since then, Yoder has noticed it attracts not just kids, but generations of families. Sure, there are slime lickers and sour candies and gummy eyeballs for the kids, but there’s also candy that evokes memories and stories from moms and dads and grandparents. Maybe it’s about sharing a Charleston Chew for the first time, or enjoying the wax bottle candy, or trying a Big Hunk bar or an Ice Cube chocolate. And (gasp) there are even candy cigarettes.
“Old-fashioned candy brings back so many memories,” Yoder said.
The store is also well-stocked with non-edible goodies – fuzzy stuffed animals, souvenirs and crazy hats. And for no apparent reason, there’s an inflatable tiger on a leash in the window. But, there doesn’t really have to be a reason as long as it fits into Sweet Ouray’s theme.
“The theme is fun,” Yoder said. Sweet Ouray is open from 10 a.m to 8 p.m. seven days a week until fall. Hours are subject to change when the summer crowds die down. For more information, email susan@sweetouray.com.
