Today is Valentine’s Day and that means most people will be giving chocolate and cards to their significant other.
What better way to do that than to buy from your local chocolate shop.
Mountain Nugget Chocolate Company has been busy prepping for Valentine’s Day orders for the past week and owner Trish Dyer said she’s been at the shop at 7 a.m. everyday.
Dyer recently moved shop further west down Columbia Avenue, which has also meant an expansion of the store front and kitchen.
She said the change came about because they needed more power for the equipment they use and the location, across from the Prestige, became available.
“It came two years early than predicted in our five year plan, but that’s always a nice thing right?” Dyer said, noting she enjoys the bigger operating space.
“It’s unbelievable, we have more room in our kitchen, we have more room up front. We’re going to be starting to make ice cream in the shop.”
For Valentines day things have picked up.
“Ever since we opened the new shop it’s been awesome,” she said.
The new shop opened on Winter Carnival weekend a few weeks ago and she said it’s been non-stop since then.
Last year, the store wasn’t open on Valentine’s Day, as many Rossland residents will remember, since Dyer was having a baby.
“It’s a very special season this year, that we’re open.”
She said the ice cream will follow the same philosophy as the chocolate does now.
“The ice cream that comes out will be the unfinished product, we finish it by dipping it in chocolate or sprinkling it with salt,” she said. “It will be just like our chocolates, but in a frozen cabinet, we’ll also have little pints as well.”
So why the move into ice cream?
“Ice cream and chocolate go really well together,” she said. “They’re a beautiful compliment to each other, one focuses on the winter season and one focusses on the summer season. It makes us a 365 degree business,”
She said business dips like everywhere else at the end of the winter season, since the ski hill only operates in the winter and brings in a lot of people to Rossland.
This is their fourth year that the business has been operating and they were in the other location for three and a half years. She said the other location was a great spot as well and she was happy to open up the spot to other businesses.
“We’ve opened up a really hot retail spot for another market to get in there, so that we can just start building retail in Rossland. It’s nice actually to see the borders of commerce expanding in Rossland.”
CLick here for more information on Mountain Nugget Chocolate Company.