Scarsdale Moms Rock Rye

Two Scarsdale moms have opened a dazzling candy store in Rye – packed with goodies of every sort – for you and your kids, as well as great merchandise, gifts and a party facility. The store is beautifully appointed, well stocked and delightful to visit. Trish Frohman of Greenacres and Valerie Stone of Edgemont are the proprietors of Candy Rox and here is the story behind the store:

Trish is the mom of two teenage girls and worked in the city before she embarked on this entrepreneurial venture. For nearly seventeen years, she worked at Turner Broadcasting overseeing the Sports Sales and Marketing Group as well as the Event Marketing and Local Ad Sales Groups. Valerie is the mother of a son in tenth grade and twin girl sixth graders. For the past 15 years she was a stay at home mom, giving her time to the PTA and various charitable causes. Valerie has a background is in merchandising and product development, and worked for ten years Perry Ellis Menswear and in private label product development for retailers such as Neiman Marcus, Ann Taylor and Land's End.

The two met on the train platform when they were commuting back and forth to work and have known each other for over 16 years. They started to formulate their concept for Candy Rox when they walked to work together and continued those conversations over many dinners.

The store wasn’t born overnight. Trish and Valerie did lots of legwork to determine the viability of their idea, researching local markets to see what kind of competition already existed, and interviewing candy and retail proprietors in New York and outside of this market to better understand the dynamics of the business. They also attended several industry trade shows to meet with suppliers and storeowners, taking notes on everything from product, pricing and display ideas. The internet was also a tremendous tool in helping them research the hippest trends and finding the newest retailers that were making news.

Once they determined that their concept was a go, they looked at which towns in the area would make the most sense for their first store. They chose Rye because it is a destination town, with vibrant retail and restaurant businesses, good parking and most importantly, a number of schools that are within walking distance of the town. Resident of Harrison, Rye Brook, Purchase, Port Chester, and Greenwich also use Rye as “their town.”

Both women liked the sense of community in Rye and felt that Purchase Street in particular was thriving at a time when many downtowns were having difficulties. Lastly, Rye is busy year-round as much of the community spends their summertime nearby.

Selecting the name Candy Rox was another big decision and once they chose it, they hired a branding expert to help bring the name to life, create a cool recognizable logo, develop store materials and build a website that will be up and running shortly.

In designing the store they sought to create an atmosphere that was a bit edgier than the typical candy store to appeal to both sexes and all age groups. To accomplish this, they pulled together images from a variety of sources that conveyed the kind of atmosphere they wanted and brought this information, along with their branding and mission statements to a series of design experts. They selected David Ashen of D-ash Design to bring it all together. The graffiti-tagged walls, barrel lights, chain link fence ceiling, and skate ramp lounge coupled with some old fashion touches like the glass jars are a few of the design elements that distinguish Candy Rox.

The store is meant to be a destination for kids…. a place they can call their own. Its sensibility is general store meets industrial/X-games sensibility and kids are invited to hang out there as their parents might do in Starbucks. Candy Rox marries candy, cool gift items and music that allow people of all ages to come in and have and immediate association with the product. Everyone can relate to candy and music and everyone has a fond memory of what it means to them. The gift items sold in the store are affordable and reflect those feelings. There is everything from jewelry, framed posters of bands, t-shirts, bags, writing journals and notebooks to retro candy, bulk candy and headphones.

Candy Rox offers birthday parties, and their PJ parties are already a hit. For the holidays, they are already providing beautifully packaged corporate gifts, using three-tier candy towers and their client’s favorite candies. For teachers and small holiday gifts there are candy filled boxes and with teddy bears.

On weekends, Candy Rox will host visits from artists and artisans to feature and sell their products. This Saturday, December 18, the artist known as “Reskew” who tagged the store walls with graffiti, will be appearing from 12-5pm to airbrush original t-shirts, creating unique gifts for all.

The store opened just a few weeks ago and so far, Valerie and Trish are extremely happy with the reception from the community, where shoppers are telling them that Candy Rox is “the coolest store ever.” Among the most popular candies are the sour gummis for younger kids and teens with older folks gravitating to the retro candy. They’ve gotten big smiles from the adults when they see the Bonomo Turkish Taffy.

Stop by yourself to see what’s so cool about Candy Rox and tell Trish and Valerie you read about them on Scarsdale10583.

Candy Rox
84 Purchase Street
914-844-6750
http://www.candyrox.net

Store Hours:
Weekdays: 11-6pm
Saturdays 12-5pm and Sundays 12 – 5 pm through the holiday season