1) How did you get the idea to start making artisan products? Celeste and Ben are the two original creators of Snake & Butterfly. When they met 4+ years ago, Ben was researching raw chocolate with all of it healthy loveliness. The timing was perfect for a chocolate company to be born, frankly if they had met a month or so earlier, we would be a sprouted nut and seed company!! One of the things that makes this business special to us and to our customers is that none of us have worked with chocolate before this. We have an unbiased outlook on chocolate and we move forward without any preconceived notions about how things are “supposed” to be done.
2) How did you get started with your business? Ben and Celeste started things slowly, researching other chocolate makers, tasting lots of different types and flavors comparing with different wines. Then they began crafting in different methods until the taste, texture and process was right. When they had something tasty, they sent samples to friends and family to get feedback and suggestions. They had late night talks about packaging and the future of the company. Celeste started handling the business side while Ben was working in product development. When Vince came on board, he kicked their butts into high gear! He helped get the business plan finished and started working out the kinks in making delicious caramels and truffles. He also started expanding the customer base and adding wholesale accounts. Jim and Mara started out as regulars at the Campbell Farmers Market and were so impressed with the product and the passion everyone had that they practically begged to be a part of the company.
3) What’s your favorite way to use your product? Besides just eating it? The single origin bars are great chopped up and mixed into baked goods, like gluten-free chocolate zucchini muffins. The jarred caramels are good with fresh fruit, over ice cream, on carrots (as our kids can attest to) or just on a spoon! We love doing wine, coffee and cigar pairings too!
4) Which product is your best seller? Our peanut butter cups are by far the most popular item we make. They are the right combination of simple organic ingredients: chocolate, peanut butter, agave and salt. That’s it!
5) What’s your friends’ and family’s favorite product you sell? The kids seem to be enjoying the peanut butter cups and the caramels, the Bacon Caramels specifically. With the adults, we find that the flavored bars like the Sea Salt & Smoked Almond and the jarred caramels, like Salted Bourbon, are increasingly favored.
6) What is your favorite part about being an artisan producer? Getting to introduce new customers to our products and seeing the enjoyment on their faces is a big highlight of our jobs. Working with quality ingredients and having a place to be creative help smooth out any of the bumps we may have along the way. Plus having a team that works easily together and seems to mainly all be on the same page about where we’re going and how we’d like to get there, really makes going to work each day a joy instead of a chore.
7) How do you get ideas for innovating with products and creating new flavors or varieties? A lot of the time, one of us will latch on to an idea and try it. Then as a group we’ll taste,test and tweak the recipe until we have found something that is unique and delicious. Our Dulce de Leche Jalapenos started out as a whole roasted and candied jalapeno, filled with the spiced dulche de leche then dipped in chocolate. In that form, it was a little messy and hard to share, so Vince (the mastermind behind that product) decided that bite size would be better. He figured out how to make them smaller. They may be little but they pack a big flavor punch!
8) What inspires your art direction and packaging? How did you come up with your style? We are all really proud of our new packaging but the credit has to go to Celeste for spearheading it’s creation and working hand in hand with the photographer - her mother, Debra - and the printer to get it just right. We wanted packaging that invoked a feeling when you looked at it, not just to tell you what you were eating but to tell you how we feel about it. For example, the peanut butter cups have bicycle tires on the package; it’s feels fun, whimsical and hearkens back to a simpler time, while the Ginger & Nib bar has a macro picture of a dahlia that feels exotic and mysterious like the taste of ginger can be at times. We went for the direction of natural and handmade with our design just like our chocolate.
9) Who inspires you in the kitchen? Who taught you to cook/produce? The raw ingredients are inspiring to work with. It’s kind of like a treasure hunt to find the best, most sustainable products we can. Then to work with them, coaxing out their richness, their subtle flavors often leaves us in awe. Some of us have traditional training in the kitchen, while the rest of us are self-taught, there’s not one chocolate “expert” in the group. We continue to learn through research, trial and error and remembering to have fun playing with our food. We inspire each other!