cc  >> I apologize for the quality  of my voice.  I hope that it will sustain us  through the course of our course  today.  I want to welcome you all back  to Entrepreneurialism in  Society.  This is a course that's offered  through the University of  Wisconsin School of Human  Ecology.  As we begin, I'd like to extend  thanks to our partners in  supporting this course.  The UW Office of Corporate  Relations for their support,  the UW College of Engineering  for their technical support and  the space, and financial from  the Kauffman Foundation which is  committed to advancing  entrepreneurial education in an  academic setting.  Additionally, we'd like to thank  our media partners Wisconsin  Public Television and their  University Place crew who join  us today and are taping our  lecture.  I am very pleased to introduce  a special guest today.  We have Markus Candinas.  Owner and chief chocolatier of  Candinas Chocolates  of Verona, Wisconsin. 

 Now if you check out  their web site,  Candinas claims to make  the finest chocolates anywhere.  To Markus Candinas, that means  creating the freshest  confections with rich flavors,  smooth textures and a taste  that defies description.  Markus learned his trade in a  three year apprenticeship  program in Switzerland.  This intensive education into  the world of confectionaries  served as a springboard and  allowed him to work next to the  best in his field and eventually  he led one of the finest  confectionaries in Europe.  Since opening its doors in 1994  Candinas Chocolatier has become  a staple of chocolate  connoisseurs and challenges  those who want to save their  chocolates for later, like I  often do, it cannot be done with  Candinas' chocolates, as his  chocolates are so fresh that  their shelf life is truly  limited.  Now I've asked Markus to come  and talk with us about his story  in the specialty food business  and what entrepreneurialism  means in the specialty food  business, and specifically to  Markus and to Candinas.  I will start by introducing him  but also by passing out Candinas  chocolates so that you can  savor each and every bite and  understand what it is that he's  here to talk with us about.  So watch for those coming your  way and please join me in  welcoming Markus Candinas.  [APPLAUSE]  >> I hope my voice holds up,  as well.  I should probably start  by saying that I don't have  any answers, really. 

 I can only convey to you what  has worked for me and what I  believe is the right way to run  a business or to be an  entrepreneur.  That said, it comes down to two  basic things.  One, whatever you want to be an  entrepreneur in, you have to be  really passionate about it.  It has to be something you  really, really care about  because you're going to be  spending a lot of time doing it  or being around it so you have  to really like it.  The other thing would be there's  a lot of books to read, there's  a lot of experts but at the end  of the day after you listened to  everything it all comes down to  common sense.  I think we can look at a lot of  things today in the news and say  if these businesses had only  used a little common sense  things would have been okay.  I'm talking about the banks  right now.  You look at the headlines what's  happened with Bear Stearns and  so on and so forth in the last  year, if they only just for a  moment thought does this make  sense, they wouldn't be in the  situation that they're in right  now.  So what's my story?  It's already been started a  little bit.  I grew up in Madison. 

 My parents were both Swiss.  And as such, I had the  opportunity to go overseas to go  to Switzerland.  That's where a lot of my  relatives, grandparents, aunts,  uncles still lived.  So as young as six years old I  can remember going to  Switzerland and eating different  foods, confectionary items and  other.  A lot of which we still don't  have here today.  But that was sort of the  foundation of getting me excited  about chocolate which is what my  business is really about is  really fine chocolates.  So that's how I got introduced  to it and as the years  progressed and I started going  through more and more years of  school, at some point I thought  I really want to do food and I  want to do food that I really  enjoy eating and having  primarily a sweet tooth I  decided to get into  confectionary.  So that's what I did.  Of course having that Swiss  passport in hand made it a  little bit easier to go to  Switzerland and take up the  field, get a job there and take  up an apprenticeship.  But that's what I did. 

 After going to school here I  moved to Switzerland and I did  an apprenticeship which is a  three year program that combines  one day a week of going to a  school specific to the  confectionary field and four and   a half days a week of working in  an actual confectionary, making  everything, doing the practical  side of what we learn in school.  After that three year  apprenticeship program I was  done with school, obviously, and  decided to stay in Switzerland  for a few more years because  it's like being done with  college, once you're done  there's still a lot of things  still kind of missing in your  education.  There's that practical  experience that you're missing.  So instead of coming back to the  US, at that point and starting  up a business, I continued to  work in a variety of  confectionaries around  Switzerland and worked my way up  through the ranks, if you will,  and after I was done with that  and decided okay, yeah, I really  do want to start my own  business, I kind of did some  traveling.  I had gotten to know a few  different people around the  world actually.  One of which had a  confectionary, or whose family I  should say, had a confectionary  and cake shop business in Japan.  They do amazing work in Japan,  just that little segue here.  They are probably the world  leaders in terms of French  pastries or top-of-the-line  pastries, let's just put it that  way.  I think they did what they do  with so many other things.  They came to Europe in the early  '70s and thought, wow, these  pastries are really good and  taste much better than these  burnt bean curd things that we  have in Japan. 

 Not that the bean curd things  are bad but they just really  liked what they saw in Europe  and so they went back to Japan  and these people started making  just really amazing pastries.  So that's one of the things that  I did after working in  Switzerland, I traveled around  the world visiting friends and  other and got a little bit more  experience that way.  And then, of course, in '94 I  came back to the US and I opened  up Candinas Chocolatier.  It's a small, simple business.  We, to this day, simply have  four full-time employees.  We do have a lot of seasonal and  part-time people.  But there's really just four of  us that work there every day.  And I like it that way.  That way, I mean, we are a small  business and I like to feel like  a small business where you know  everybody who works for you.  I think a small business has  advantages in the same way that  large businesses have advantage. 

 But what I like about keeping  the business small is that you  can be nimble, you can be quick,  you can adjust to changing  trends, needs, you can make your  business be really what the big  business can't be.  Because I think as a big  business you sometimes you have  many more processes, many more  steps, many more people that are  involved and frankly whose  opinion matters when you're  changing how maybe you do  something.  Whereas a small business, and  that's probably what all of you  are really at this point is  you're all individuals trying to  figure out what do you want to  do, you have to be willing to  make a change on the fly and be  able to say this makes more  sense, this is more realistic or  this is going to go further.  And I think that's really  important is that you do the  things that you, as a small  business, that you do those  things that the big business  can't do.  Because if a big business wants  to bring in a new product they  have all their development time  and okay now we got to get the  packaging people involved and  then there's distribution and  all these other questions that  come into play.  If you're the small guy and you  just have one location so, for  example, maybe just you working  there, it's you that has the  idea and says I'm going to make  this chair in blue.  You don't need to have a big  panel about it.  Should we make a blue chair or  should we make a green chair?  No you want a blue chair you  decide we'll make a blue chair  instead of just red ones.  And I think that's the beauty  and I think that is, in essence  really, what makes a small  business work is because you can  or you should be offering  something that the big guys  don't.  And feel free, anybody, to jump  in with questions as I banter  because I'm imagine that's  probably what I'll be doing  here. 

 Is there any questions?  Nope.  So what I decided is out of all  the myriad of confectionary  products that I studied in  Switzerland, everything from ice  creams and cakes and torts and  bakery items like croissants and  rolls and up through chocolates  and even within that scope the  confectionary field in Europe  also encompasses some salty  sandwiches, some savory items, I  decided to focus on chocolates.  The reason I decided to focus on  chocolates, as opposed to any of  these other items, is a  combination of things.  One, I was really passionate  about chocolates and French  pastries.  So right off the bat you'd think  those were the two things I  would get in to.  And they were obviously, but I  did not do or even focus on  French pastries at all because I  grew up in the US.  I grew up in Madison.  Traveled around a lot and I  realized that there are  substantial differences to the  way we here in America treat  food, as opposed to the  Europeans.  One of those things is that  while the attitudes are  changing, 20 years ago coffee  was that bottomless cup you'd  get at some sort of family  restaurant for 99-cents.  Today, most people when they  think of coffee, they think of  the $3-$4 cup you'd buy at any  number of the coffee chains or  coffee shops and that represents  kind of a change in thinking. 

 But when I opened up in '94 that  coffee thing, for example,  really hadn't reached its full  potential yet.  And when you looked at how  people treated sweets, they  really weren't thinking about  oh, let's go to a pastry shop  and buy something that needs to  be eaten within hours, much less  days.  Most people were used to  buying cookies, cakes, whatever,  putting it in the fridge and  when the whim strikes you, oh,  hey, let's take a box of cookies  out of the cupboard.  And that really wasn't the kind  of product that I wanted to  make.  I wanted to make something that  had very perishable items in it,  fresh eggs, cream and frankly if  it wasn't consumed within a  matter of hours it just wouldn't  have the same texture, it  wouldn't have the same moisture,  the creaminess and, frankly, if  you kept it around as long as  most people really are used to  keeping around foods, it quite  possibly could get you sick  because like I said it would  have raw uncooked eggs in it  which sounds gross maybe to some  people but it's really delicious  if, like I said, you eat it  fresh.  But it was that realization and  acknowledgement, that  understanding of who I'm trying  to sell to and the fact that  were just not used to handling  food that way that I decided  that I'm going to go the easy  route, so to speak, and do  chocolates which have 10 days to  work with.  In other words, you buy the  chocolate and you can eat them  within 10 days and they will  still be excellent.  I felt like that was more of a  challenge than, like I said,  trying to sell something that  people would have to eat within  hours.  Because even with chocolate, we  have to keep in mind that when I  opened up in '94, the market  leader in the world of fine  chocolates, if you asked a  person on the street who makes  the best chocolate on anybody  pretty much in the US, you asked  anybody, they would say Godiva.  And I owe a lot to Godiva  because I think if they hadn't  come along in the '70s and  opened up the US to fine  chocolates, they created a world  where people now were used to  spending over $30 for a pound of  chocolate. 

 Now that compared to the candy  bar that costs well under a  dollar at the time, that was  quite a big deal.  So it's really important to  acknowledge that Godiva was a  good thing for me, but at the  same time Godiva was and is a  product that it has a nine month  shelf life.  And to reeducate people into  thinking okay, well I know you  think that you can just put  chocolates in your cupboard,  your Fannie May and whatever  they all are, Godiva, and just  open up that box a month later  but that's not really what fine  chocolate is.  And part of the reason why those  products can keep for so long  and my product doesn't is not so  much that we don't add  preservatives, I'm not saying  that we add preservatives, but  it's not so much that they add  preservatives, it's more what  they don't include in their  product.  Give you an example, if you look  at our box of chocolates and you  look the at a box from Godiva,  the ingredient list will be  pretty similar.  It will say things like cream,  it will say things like  raspberries, a number of  ingredients, butter, you name  it.  But what it won't say is a lot  of those ingredients are missing  moisture.  They dehydrated the raspberries  that go in the raspberry  truffle.  They've removed as much as  moisture as they can from things  like dairy and then they replace  that with other vegetable oils  and fat so that it still kind of  slides down your throat and  still tastes decent.  But it's that essential  moisture, that natural moisture  that comes in raspberries, I  mean if you go to a store and  you have fresh raspberries and  you have dried raspberries,  dried raspberries are good but  there's nothing quite like a  fresh raspberry that's right off  the vine and is just bursting  with flavor. 

 That's what fresh is.  It just has its unique flavor.  So by removing a lot of that  moisture they've actually really  enhanced the shelf life of the  product.  Because what does bacteria need  to grow?  I'm not sure if this is a food  related class or not but  basically what bacteria needs to  grow is it needs air and it  needs moisture just like pretty  much all living organisms, that  I'm aware of anyway.  And if you remove one of those  items, speak the moisture,  you've really substantially  impeded the ability for bacteria  to grow.  So that's what they just remove  as much moisture as they can  because removing the air, that's  a little bit more tricky.  So now I'm kind of coming full  circle to this point I started  making about five minutes ago  which is you have to do  something that the big guy  can't.  Godiva can't really do a product  that has a 10 day shelf life  because how do you get it to all  your stores?  How do you manufacture it and  distribute it and you have so  many thousands, millions of  people that are using your  product, getting everybody to  understand, okay, well you know  you're used to having a product  that has a longer shelf life but  now we want you to eat it within  10 days, it's just not that easy  to do.  Whereas a small business, you  can more readily say okay, you  have a more interpersonal  relationship with each customer  where you can say you have to  eat this within 10 days.  And you give people samples and  you can build an understanding,  a relationship, where that  relationship works. 

 Are there any other questions?  Yeah?  >> With all the traveling you  said you've done what made you  come back to Madison to pick a  location?  >> And I'm just going to repeat  the question so we make sure we  get it on the tape, with all the  traveling you did Markus, what  made you come back to Madison?  >> Well, like I was just saying  about understanding what  customers want and need or are  used to by the example of  pastries where people really  aren't used to buying something  and eating it the same day,  being from Madison I felt like I  had a little bit of an  understanding of how people  thought here.  And while doing all the  traveling I did overseas and  living in Switzerland where you  ride your bike literally for a  half an hour and people are  speaking a whole different  language, all of the sudden  you're not speaking German  anymore, you're speaking French.  You take your car two hours in  the other direction and all the  sudden everybody's speaking  Italian.  Things change a lot more in a  very small area over in Europe.  And here when I travel  throughout the US, the  differences aren't as pronounced  but yet still there's a big  difference between how people  think here in the Midwest and  how people think on the east  coast or on the west coast.  And there even on the west coast  there's big differences between  say southern California and the  way people think in northern  California.  And like I said, you've got  Florida, east coast, you name  it, there are differences in the  way people think.  And I think it's really  important that you understand  your customers and how to relate  to them and how to flip their  buttons, how to get them to  really be excited about your  product.  I'll give you an example.  I would have loved to been in a  really high profile location  like Michigan Avenue in Chicago  or Park Avenue in New York City. 

 That was really the more logical  place, for what is now  recognized as being one of the  top chocolates in the country,  to be.  But I realized that one, I knew  people in Madison better and I  wanted to have more money  leftover for actually making the  chocolate, and I'll get to that  point a little bit later.  But the example I wanted to  mention is being from Madison I  knew the people here and how  people thought and I think that  when I look at other top candy  makers that have tried to sell  their product in other markets,  they haven't always faired so  well.  I'll give you an example, a  manufacturer out of Zurich,  Switzerland, called Teuscher.  They do a nice product, I would  say an excellent product  although if you ask someone on  the street in Zurich what's the  best confectionary here,  Teuscher would probably come  third, maybe fourth down the  line but that's a whole  different matter.  They've had shops all around the  country, all around the world.  They have a shop right now I  believe in Boston; I think they  still have one in New York.  For a while they had one  in Los Angeles.  And they, as so many other  chocolate shops that have tried  today open up shops in LA,  haven't done so well, and I have  some theories on that.  They had a beautiful store. 

 It was just off of Rodeo Drive  which is a pretty popular,  well-known address in Hollywood  and LA.  Probably spent a huge amount of  money on the store but LA is  different than a lot of the  other areas where shops like  Teuscher have locations.  LA is not a city like New York,  it's not a city like Zurich or  Paris where Teuscher also has  stores.  And I think one of big  differences is that people in LA  don't really walk around that  much.  They drive a lot.  And just that one little element  I think says a lot.  Because they put a store in a  place where people have a really  hard time finding a parking spot  and then they have to walk to  the store to buy their product  and then they pick up their  product and they get it in a  little baggy that's beautiful  but now they have to walk  through 80 whatever degree  temperatures to get back to  their now hot car which they're  going to drive around for  another few hours and probably  won't get home till, who knows,  six hours after they bought  their chocolate.  Right there it seems like common  sense that how is that going to  work?  I mean, you need to be able to  understand that okay, people in  LA they may love chocolate,  you're right they're dying for a  good chocolate shop but people  are not going to walk some place  to get product and then have it  melted by the time they get  home.  They need a product that ideally  they can get in their car and is  packaged in such a way that at  the end of the day, eight hours  later or even an hour later,  will still be in one piece, or  maybe I shouldn't say in one  piece because melted would be in  one piece but in however many  individual pieces it was  supposed to be.  So that's why I came back to  Madison. 

 >> We had a question back here.  >> Hey Markus, my name is Jeff.  Thanks for talking to us today.  >> Hey, Jeff.  >> I was wondering if you could  talk more specifically about the  challenges you faced when  educating your market and how  you overcame maybe some people  that didn't really know what you  were offering.  >> I think the education, if you  will, is ongoing.  When I started up, the thing I  did to try and educate people is  I gave people samples which I  don't know if you guys have all  gotten samples yet, I those  should be working their way  around shortly.  That was really the best way I  felt to educate people on my  product.  Because, at least in food,  that's really the best way to do  it.  I mean, I can talk for hours  about cocoa content and cocoa  butter and freshness and this  and that and well we make our  chocolates under vacuum as  opposed to a wire whisk or we  can do these RPMs when we mix it  as opposed to that. 

 And those all sound great and  they make for great propaganda  and advertising but to really  convince somebody, they just  have to try your product.  And that's what I did.  So whenever people came in the  store, I basically just not  literally threw a sample in  their face but I gave people  samples.  And in that way already people  are understanding, oh, this is  something a little bit different  from what I'm used to.  Whereas if I just, like I said,  stood there and talked until  I was blue in my face,  I don't know if it would have  had the same impact.  And I think that as we go  forward in the future it will be  more and more important at least  with food that that's how we  have to sell product is just get  people to try it because there  are so many, we in the US are  great are selling things.  We can sell anything.  Even things that probably  shouldn't be sold, we can sell  here.  It's because we're really good  at marketing.  And also that a lot of the rest  of the world isn't very good at  marketing. 

 But we're really good at just  making up labels and terms.  I mean, look at a 3 Musketeers  bar, it has nougat in it.  At least that's what we're led  to believe.  And from what I understand in my  educational process over in  Europe and the apprenticeship,  that's not a nougat.  A nougat is something that is  basically caramel and nuts, in  some way shape or form.  There may also be eggs, there  may be some candied fruit.  There maybe a number of other  things but I don't really see  this whole Milky Way and things,  I don't see that as being a  nougat.  But I suspect that at some point  in the '50s somebody was in a  marketing room.  How do we describe this candy  bar?  Well, it's got chocolate on the  outside.  It's got caramel, it's got this  fluffy stuff on the inside. 

 Well, can we sell that?  No, but what can we call it?  We'll call it nougat.  And somehow that took and that's  how we sold it.  I think that there's just a lot  of propaganda out there and some  of it is frustrating and some of  it can be good.  But I think what's frustrating  is when you have people come  into your store and they say, I  don't like truffles or I don't  like milk chocolate or I don't  like dark chocolate or I don't  like this and I don't like that.  And you point out to people well  actually you just had a truffle  or you just had a milk  chocolate.  Oh, well that was good.  And part of the reason that  these things happen is because  people have these ideas of what  they do and don't like.  And it's not that they don't  know what they like or don't  like it's just that they think  they like or don't like  something that isn't really what  it is.  Because they've had bad milk  chocolate all their lives they  think I just don't like it.  Well, maybe you just never had  good milk chocolate. 

 Or I don't like dark chocolate,  maybe they've never really had a  good dark chocolate that doesn't  have a bitter, acidic  after-taste.  And this goes beyond just  confectionary.  When you look at some of the  chains that are selling things  whether it's panini or whatever,  I sometimes wonder, there's  going to be a point where  somebody comes along who wants  to sell, I don't know -- or  panini or some sort of really  ethnic food from Italy or France  or wherever that we're not used  to having here, crepes would be  another example, where people  just think I don't really like  crepes but maybe it's just  because they've never had it.  Speaking of crepes I'll give you  an example.  I was in San Francisco last year  and I was in this beautiful food  court and thought I need  something to eat.  Oh, there's a crepes stand.  Wow, this is great.  I'm in a city that has a crepes  stand.  This is what I need right now.  So I'm watching them make it and  they're doing a nice job with  the crepe itself and then start  loading things on. 

 And they load it up like a  burrito, just piled things on  there, and I thought to myself,  huh?  I know in America we like to  have more and more things on our  food.  And I thought how are you even  going to get it closed.  And they obviously couldn't get  it closed; they kind of mushed  it all together.  And I thought to myself this is  really an example of what I'm  just talking about.  People have no idea of what a  good crepe could be.  When you see a crepe on a market  over in say Paris or Zurich or  wherever, you think it's a  little thin piece of cooked  dough and they put a small ladle  of applesauce and they sprinkle  cinnamon on that?  That can't be, I feel cheated.  I'm paying like five euros, like  six bucks for this.  I feel cheated.  But then when you eat it and you  go, wow, that's really good and  you feel satiated after you're  done.  What more do you need?  But I think we are so used to  having more and more that that's  kind of how we've sold things is  you get three for the price of  one or you get two pounds of a  burrito. 

 I heard something on the radio  just the other day where in  Vegas they have a burrito  that's, I feel like they said it  was 20-pounds, that's ridiculous  but I think that's what they  said, 20-pounds, and if you ate  it all it was free.  And it's a great gimmick because  who the heck is going to be able  to eat the whole darn thing so  you spend 20 bucks on this  burrito but one out of a million  is able to eat the whole darn  thing, and you give them their  20 bucks back.  That's great marketing but is it  great food?  I haven't had the burrito so I  can't say, but my guess is  probably not.  I mean, 20-pounds of really high  quality ingredients is going to  cost you more than 20 bucks.  That's just my impression  anyway.  >> Markus, and again I apologize  for my voice, but you're going  into an area that I find  fascinating.  We've heard from entrepreneurs  in retailing and in the media  and we'll hear from others in  social sectors as well, but what  you're saying makes me think,  and also in context with the  question that you asked, that  entrepreneurialism in food  creation, especially in this  country, must be very  challenging because we do have a  different relationship with food  in this country then almost  anywhere else on the planet.  I just offer that.  Can you comment on that?  >> Yes, it is challenging, but  at the same time, it's nice.  Because, granted it's not a  clean slate because like I'm  saying you do have these  preconceived notions of what  things are like, but part of the  reason I decided to open up a  shop here as opposed to  committing to live in Europe and  opening up a shop there is that  there's nobody around doing it. 

 There's nobody making any really  fine chocolates here.  There was a confectioner  exporting chocolates  to New York.  There was a guy in the  Chicagoland area who was doing  a great job but nobody knew  about, because he was just  making it out of the kitchen  of a restaurant.  It's like you kind of had a  clean slate in that way.  But I understand what you're  saying because I also wonder,  you know, fast forward 10 years  after I opened up my shop in  '94, you start seeing more and  more people making chocolate  here in Madison.  And I think to myself why would  you do that?  I mean, why would you go to a  city where you've got, at the  time and actually still, the top  ranked chocolate in the country  being made, why do you go right  into his back yard and say I'm  making candy too.  It just seems kind of weird.  But then I realized that they  don't really have to convince  people about oh, you got to eat  this within 10 days.  And you don't have to convince  people that this chocolate costs  a little more because it tastes  a lot better.  If you go to Omaha, Nebraska,  you may have a wide open market  where there's no other chocolate  makers around but you've got to  do that whole leg work of  getting people to understand  what makes a fine chocolate a  fine chocolate. 

 So I guess it's sort of open to  interpretation as far as what is  the smarter way to go.  For me, I like the challenge, I  guess, of going into a market  and just creating a business,  and on the other hand, there's  certain difficulties that go  along with that.  Did you have a question?  >> Yeah, I did.  Kind of going a long with what  you are saying, I've noticed  that there are a lot of --  chocolatiers in Madison.  How do you stay current and  differentiate yourself?  [INAUDIBLE]  >> Sure.  Should I repeat the question  a little bit?  The question was how do I  differentiate myself in a town  where, yes, there's now a lot of  other people trying to make  fine chocolate.  And you just have to do the best  job you can, I guess is the  really simplified answer to  that.  But if you kind of follow the  other candy makers in Madison  you notice that there's that  whole marketing, that propaganda  thing that pops up.  One manufacturer for a long time  was all about dark chocolate.  And was all about the  antioxidants in dark chocolate. 

 And that's what you've got to  have because it's good for you.  And that's great and I think  that's how that brand initially  got started is it's all about  dark chocolate, it's good for  you, antioxidants, and those  things are true.  And the darker the better, this  and that, and cocoa percentages  of 70%, anything less is just no  good.  Again that's all marketing.  So I guess if you're trying to  figure out well how do I build  up a business, well that's  definitely something to note and  say come up with some clever  marketing, some key words and  that's how you do it.  But it's also interesting to see  that that business doesn't  really that kind of marketing  the same way anymore.  They haven't gone away from it  but they've kind of realized  that you kind of alienate  yourself a little bit because,  take wine.  I prefer red wine myself but  there are some great white wines  out there.  And if you're eating a filet  versus eating fish you're going  to have two different wines that  you're probably going to eat  with that.  And that deep, rich zinfandel,  that's probably not going to go  with that fish as well. 

 Even though I really like it,  it's not going to go that well.  And with chocolate milk versus  dark it's kind of the same  thing.  That dark chocolate is very  strong, very powerful flavor and  some flavors are just not going  to come through in the same way.  Also the acidity that is just  inherent in a darker chocolate,  less so in a milk.  That's going to play along with  the flavors a little bit and the  point is there's just some  things that make for a better  balance composition if it's not  dark versus being milk.  How else do you stay on top, I  guess is the question, or stay  ahead of the game with other  manufacturers?  You just have to believe in what  you're doing.  And be honest with yourself.  I think that's kind of a  recurring thing with starting a  business and being an  entrepreneur is you just have to  be honest with yourself and say  am I really still doing the best  thing?  And that's why I still like to  travel and try other people's  chocolate is, I mean, we were  rated one of three chocolates  to be the best in the US by  Consumer Reports back in '02.  The other two were -- which is a  great outfit but they're out of  Paris so they're really  expensive in New York.  And then there's another outfit,  a small place out of Manhattan  as well. 

 Two years later we kind of  reinvented the wheel.  We'd always been making  chocolate square and round,  different shapes, and we had a  certain method that we were  making chocolates at that time.  And that was great.  Like I said, it got us noticed  as being one of the top  chocolates in the country.  But I realized there's a better  way to make this product.  So we implemented a process and  got some technology, built  machines, whereby we had, on a  molecular level at least, a very  smooth filling and we could do  more of it in a short period of  time.  So obviously having smoother  filling, that was good.  Being able to make more of it in  a shorter period of time, that  was good too because the  chocolate business is very  seasonal.  You'll do a lot of business in  December, you'll do a lot of  business around Valentine's Day.  Everybody gives a box of  chocolates Valentine's Day, or  everybody should, maybe I should  say that. 

 So if you want to have fresh  product at that time, you need  to be able to make a lot of it  in a short period of time.  So that does bear consideration.  So if you don't have the ability  to make a lot of product in a  short period of time, then you  have to work ahead.  In other words, you have to  start making your Valentine's  Day chocolates back in December  or October or whenever it is and  that's not going to be same  quality product.  So we also changed, in 2004 for  our 10 year anniversary, our  packaging.  Which again the packaging had  gotten design awards.  I don't know what other candy  manufacturer at the time had  gotten design awards.  We thought this is great  packaging but we do a lot of  shipping and it's not as good as  it could be.  The chocolate roll around a  little bit.  This also has to do with the  fact that some of the chocolates  are round which traditionally  chocolate truffles were round. 

 But I recognized that there's a  better shape for chocolates  when you ship them.  It's square.  But square chocolates are not  ideal from an manufacturing  process.  So we developed what we called  the squarcle.  The squarcle is not square,  it's not circle, it's squarcle.  It's kind of a squared off  circle, it's a squarcle.  [LAUGHTER]  And the benefit of  that is that the chocolates are  ideal from a manufacturing  standpoint, and they don't roll  around in the shipping and then,  combined with the new box that  was designed to really protect  the chocolates, it made the  product better.  So I feel like I'm coming full  circle now with the answer being  that you have to be honest with  yourself about everything and  you have to be your biggest  critic really and say can I do  this better?  And if you can, then that's the  way you have to try to go.  I'm not saying that you have to  be your biggest critic to the  point where you doubt everything  you do.  You to have to move forward and  at some point say okay, this is  what we have to do even though  maybe you don't have all the  data in yet. 

 >> Okay, I just want to offer  that we have another, we have a  group of people outside that are  trying to come in at 3:30 and I  have two people who have  questions, I have three people.  So let's try and get all three  questions in.  And this is a marvelous  conversation.  So Travis you ask first and then  I'll go down the line.  >> Hi, Markus.  My name is Travis.  My question is you talked a lot  about being a small business and  being able to change in the  market, are you happy with the  size of your market now or are  you trying to expand it to get a  bigger share and how would that  affect your business?  >> I want it all.  >> That's a good question.  >> No, I don't think I'm ever  really happy.  I think that's part of what  keeps you going is you  constantly want a little more. 

 I guess I'm a capitalist.  But I think you also have to  kind of recognize your  limitations.  It would have been really easy  at some point to say I'm not  just going to do chocolate  truffles, I'm going to do bars.  I'm going to do chocolate bars  because that's kind of the rage  right now and you could make a  lot of money selling chocolate  bars.  But I recognize that there's  limitations there because the  bars are the kind of product  that they're ideally suited  for the big guys.  And I don't want to be known  as somebody who's doing  something other than really the  best, and I think chocolate bars  are good but if you go into a  store and you buy a bar that's a  Candinas bar and then somebody  asks you have you had Candinas,  you might say it's pretty good.  But you only had the bar, you  didn't have the truffles.  So I think you have to be  careful about expanding and  being true to what your original  vision was and yet being able  and willing to deviate from the  course if it's necessary or  ideal.  And I say deviate in the same  way that I was just describing  how we changed our packaging,  we changed certain aspects  in how we made the product.  So you have to be willing to  stray a little bit if it's  better or if it's the direction  you want to go, but I think it's  really easy sometimes to,  say you have a crepe stand  and you want to make crepes  and at some point you get to  the point where you know what,  I can only do so many crepes,  it takes me so long to make it,  how can I make more?  People want more. 

 And there's a few different ways  of doing that.  You could probably make them and  put them under a heat lamp and  sell them later or you can get  another crepe pan and have  someone else working side by  side.  You have to kind of at that  point say okay, what do I want?  It's probably cheaper to just  get the heat lamp but is your  product going to be better or  worse after that.  And you just have to respect  kind of the limitations that you  set for yourself.  >> Hi, I'm Danielle.  And you mentioned doing a lot of  shipping and so with having a  10 day shelf life how does that  affect your shipping schedule?  Do you have to overnight a lot  of stuff?  >> It is difficult because in  the summer it gets really hot,  not just in Florida and southern  California, it gets hot  everywhere.  So we do have to do a lot  of overnight shipping.  The rest of the year when it's  not that warm we still just do  one or two day service.  Which these days is pretty  costly because shipping rates  have really gone up in the last  year, two years.  But I don't necessarily see that  as a bad thing. 

 You have a lot of chocolatiers  out on the east coast and you've  got a fair amount on the west  coast.  There's not many really even  kind of good ones in the Midwest  so being in the Midwest you can  ship to a lot of people in one  and two days without having to  cost a lot for the shipping.  Whereas, if you're in New York  and you've got to ship it  one day to Madison your shipping  rates going to be higher.  Whereas, if obviously I'm here  in Madison and I need to send  something one day to Chicago  it costs me a lot less.  So I'm not sure if I really  answered your question in the  way you're expecting or hoping.  >> All these practical questions  about items that are just either  art or food or for pleasure.  I want to thank Markus Candinas  for joining us and of course as  the students and I contemplated  what we would like to get you to  say thank you we picked out a  bottle of fine red wine.  So we hope that you enjoy that.  Thank you, very much, Markus.  [APPLAUSE]