The Nut Garden

The Nut Garden's product page for its milk chocolate cinnamon bears admits the bears come with dings and dents. The Bluffdale shop coats them in real milk chocolate, the page explains, while many candy makers use a cheaper compound coating that stays smoother. For anyone who wants a flawless bear, the page recommends a heat gun or a blow dryer on low.

The business behind the bears started on a bicycle. Brett Davis was a student at Utah Valley State College when a new company called the Nutty Guys set up a booth in a school hallway, selling dried fruit and nuts. He called the owner and asked to sell the same products in Salt Lake City, splitting the profit and making his own deliveries. He pedaled from business to business with a price list, and local bakeries bought.

That arrangement lasted 18 years. Davis registered an s-corporation and distributed almost nothing but Nutty Guys products, mostly to hospitals and grocery stores. Then the supply gave out. The Nutty Guys went out of business, and the candy company that bought it went bankrupt. The gift company that came next tried to keep him stocked until it could not make the margins work.

Several large customers went under in the same stretch and left him with more than $200,000 in unpaid invoices. Davis told Voyage Utah that a 9 to 5 job often looked appealing. He adapted instead. His wife came up with the name The Nut Garden and drew the logo. He hired a former Nutty Guys employee and rented a small corner of the old Nutty Guys facility to start packaging his own products.

That first building had its own trouble. A pallet of pecans arrived with a moth infestation, and Davis's entire account of the episode, in the same interview, is four words: "That caused problems."

When the space got too small, Davis called his first delivery driver, who had since built and sold a distribution business in Colorado. The driver was about to leave a Kneaders franchise, so he moved back to Utah and joined. Davis's wife found a building in Bluffdale close to both their homes, and it was visible enough around Bluffdale that they put a store in the front.

The company now calls itself primarily a manufacturer and distributor of snack foods. It runs its own chocolate enrober, and shoppers can often watch chocolate products come out of the cooling tunnel. The FAQ says the shop covers a long list of confections in its own Belgian chocolate. The shelves also carry other companies' goods, and the store doubles as the outlet for Utah Truffles and Mrs. Call's caramels, with a seconds sale on the second Saturday of each month.

Locals can order on the website and pick up in Bluffdale to skip the shipping charge. The bears will still have dents.