Stephen's Gourmet is a food and drink brand founded in Utah in 1990. It is headquartered in Farmington, Utah.
Stephen's Gourmet started as a present nobody paid for. In the 1980s Stephen Story, a food scientist, mixed batches of hot chocolate in his Davis County kitchen and handed them to neighbors at Christmas. In 1990 the gift became a business, Stephen's Gourmet Kitchens, and Story later licensed the mix to a powdered food maker, Excellent Foods. The brand is run from Farmington today.
The money had a job. Profits, along with salary equivalents for Story and his wife, Jan, went into a trust for their son Dallin, who was born with cerebral palsy. "There's enough money in there now, so that when Jan and I are no longer able to take care of Dallin, he'll have what he needs," Story told the Deseret News. By late 2000 the cocoa reportedly held 40 percent of the Utah market and sold in 48 states.
In 2002 Farmington's Indulgent Foods took over the U.S. trademark and marketing rights, while Story kept the foreign markets under a separate company with a different formula. In 2004 Indulgent Foods said it expected to produce and sell 2.5 million pounds of cocoa that year. The Christmas list had grown some.
In early 2010 Stephen's, a hot cocoa brand, launched Stephen's Gourmet Fry Sauce.
I've always gravitated to Stephen's. Great stuff, and real bang for your buck.
Alex
