Looking back at how far our business has come in the past 10 years, I am amazed. My son, who will be 21 in a month, has been telling me for several years that we needed to go “BIG” with the business. Now that we have gone "BIG", he is living away from home at college for the first time. He did mention that he is going to miss making it, and I told him "don't worry honey, we will save some for you!" We joked about going "BIG" last year and gave ourselves “executive” titles. Of course, I am President and CEO. I made my fiancé CFO because he keeps my spending on track when I get a little crazy at the craft stores! My daughter, who we have called the “packaging manager” for many years, was not so excited about “going big” and my son told her when we are millionaires from Butler’s Brittle, you will have wished that you stuck with us!!! Well, we aren’t looking to be millionaires; just hoping to make a product that people love and that can eventually support our family on its own.
We also have our dog Cooter has head of security, because we always joke that someone bound to want our famous recipe and we need to protect it, kind of the like the Bush’s Baked Beans dog!!! Cooter is the dog you might have seen in some of our pictures eating brittle. He absolutely loves it, and we’ve taken some cute pictures of him lying out in the grass holding it between his little paws, eating away! Can’t you just picture that!
That’s it for now, back later with some more “family brittle stories”!!
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We buy our peanuts fresh from a big wholesaler in a town about 25 miles away from where we live. We are fortunate that one of their employees lives in our town and his wife make brittle too. (not as good as ours though!) Anyways, he is kind enough that when we need peanuts, we call him up, order them and he will deliver them to our town. We just have to go pick them up at his house. Well, one day last year, I ordered some, but we had not had a chance to go pick them up. We were in the big middle of making our Christmas orders and I realized we were running out. I sent my son to go pick them up, but apparently I didn’t specify that they were already in town. He was gone for a long time, it should have only taken about 25 minutes for him to go and get back, and so I called him and asked where he was. “I’m just pulling up to Wilco’s he said”, and I’m like “what the heck, they were already in town”. He started laughing and said “You didn’t mention that part”! He obviously thought I needed him to go all the way to the wholesalers!
Oh well, another 45 minutes and a half a tank of gas later, he made it back, just in time to wash and fill more pots!!
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Well, looks like it will be a busy holiday weekend for Butler’s Brittle. We have a couple of big orders to fill and with the crazy weather here in Texas, we have to make it while the “gettin’s good”! Brittle is very finicky. If it’s too humid (which it is most of the time in South Texas), the brittle doesn’t dry and gets sticky to the touch. We DO NOT like sticky brittle. When the weather is like that, we have to package it quickly.
Our original plan was to make it on Monday, since it is Labor Day, we figured we would “labor” all day, but the weather won’t be ideal for making it, so it looks like Saturday will be the day. We have our security lined up, in case any of our competitors get wind that we are making it and try to come and steal our secrets!! So, if you have ordered any, or have won some in one of our contests….GOOD NEWS….your brittle will be shipping out on Tuesday!
Have a great holiday weekend and we will update you on Monday with our brittle stories.
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If you have been keeping up with our blog, you already know that for most of the years that Butler’s Brittle has been in existence, it has been my kids and I who have made it. Well, on the weekends when we would be in “brittle mode”, my kids would get invitations to go and do things with their friends or cousins. Of course they would have to turn them down, which you have to admit is hard for teenagers, but they understood why we had to make it. After doing that a few times, my son started telling them that we had the “brittle factory” open and that we would be doing free tours on such and such day from such and such hours. Everyone, including us got a big kick out of it. Now the joke amongst my VERY large family is that “if the Butler’s aren’t around, it must be because the brittle factory is open!”
