WILLOUGHBY, Ohio — For Erin Naso, the kitchen at Brandt’s Candies is synonymous with childhood.
She remembers sampling bits of freshly made marshmallow and sneaking a taste of chocolate from the metal melting vats. But her favorite treats were the peppermint patties or creams, which Naso called Aggie um-ums – after her great-aunt, who owned the store.
“I knew the cherry cordials that they made, which were legendary,” Naso said of her great-aunt Agnes Brandt and great-uncle George Brandt, who opened the business in 1948. “As were the bourbon cherries – if you were a customer who knew to ask for that.”
In January, while scrolling on Instagram, Naso was surprised to see that old kitchen in Willoughby pop up. And she was even more surprised to see a 26-year-old entrepreneur strolling through the space, like a kid in a candy store.
“If you’ve followed me, you know how much I enjoy preserving history,” Jeff Morsfield told 43,000-plus followers in a video about his plans to move into the building. “And this place is filled with history.”
Naso didn’t follow Morsfield’s candy-making business, Jeff’s Candy Shop, on social media. But somehow, his post popped up in her feed. That’s kind of what this whole story is about – moments of serendipity. And the return of something sweet on Lost Nation Road.
“It’s like everything is supposed to happen this way, you know?” Naso said.
‘A crazy thing’
Morsfield wasn’t looking to move.
Last summer, he opened a small store on Cleveland’s East Side, in the Waterloo Arts District. He’d spent months navigating byzantine processes at City Hall. It took intervention from Mayor Justin Bibb and Councilman Mike Polensek to get to a grand opening in June.
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Now business is steady and growing, between the Waterloo shop and online sales. Last year, Morsfield was able to hire a couple of employees.
Leading up to the holidays, he was busy making candy in a basement kitchen a few blocks away and filling orders for English toffee bars, retro lemon drops and candied nuts. Meanwhile, Morsfield’s mentors kept texting him about an empty building in Willoughby.
The property, the former Brandt’s kitchen and store, was headed to auction on Nov. 20. There was no minimum bid. And all the equipment – from a massive mixer to the copper cooking kettles to the marble-topped tables – was still there.
Morsfield showed up at the auction early.
“A lot of time I spend is looking for these antique things,” he said, pointing to vintage candy rollers and other gadgets. “So I’m always on eBay, Facebook, just wherever you find used stuff. … Walking in here and seeing, just, all the things I’ve been looking for already, ready to go, was a crazy thing.”
But he didn’t have enough money to buy the property. He quickly dropped out of the bidding. Then the buyer, a local investor who entered the winning bid by phone, showed up.
And Morsfield asked if the new landlord needed a tenant. A 10-minute conversation in the parking lot laid the groundwork for a lease deal that ultimately got signed in January.
Now Morsfield is cleaning up the kitchen and remodeling the wood-paneled retail space, with hopes of opening in April. The Waterloo shop will stay open until he moves.
“This building, they’ve been producing candy out of here since 1948,” he said during a recent tour of the space, before renovations started. “So for over 70 years, just constant candy production. … I was like, what a great opportunity to keep that candy making going.”
‘By the time they leave, they’re smiling’
Naso’s great-aunt kept Brandt’s Candies in the family until 1995. Then she sold the business, along with the handwritten recipes and the brand.
Brandt’s passed through a few other owners. In 2005, a tax consultant and former teacher named Barbara Phillips bought the business and the building with her husband, James. Her adult children ran the shop, with help from experienced chocolate-dippers.
“Our first Easter was a disaster because we didn’t have enough of anything. … And I ordered the wrong type of foil Easter eggs,” said Barb Tabernik, one of Phillips’ daughters.
“But as we learned, it became a lot of fun,” she said, recalling how customers would peek into the kitchen to see the workers pouring caramel, jellies or cream.
“If there was a little bit left of the caramel in the copper pots, they were allowed to have a taste of it,” Tabernik said.
The family catered to generations of customers, from elementary school kids to the longtime shoppers who still remembered George and Agnes Brandt.
“We’ve had people come in there and cry. And we’ve had people come in there and laugh hysterically,” Tabernik said. “And we’ve had people come in there and be mad – not usually. And usually, by the time they leave, they’re smiling.”
After 18 years, though, Tabernik’s mother was in her late 80s and ready to move on. On Dec. 23, 2023, the family quietly closed the doors at Brandt’s.
They left everything as it was – chocolate in the melting vats, an enormous bin filled with cornstarch, a spackle-like crust of pink sugar in the cordial-tossing machine – in hopes that another confectioner would step in.
“We were hoping somebody was gonna buy it and take over, you know, doing all the things that we did,” Tabernik said.
The family put the whole thing up for sale. But nobody wanted the businesses. And there wasn’t much interest in the building, which includes a downstairs apartment where George and Agnes Brandt originally lived.
After a while, Tabernik thought the building was likely to be demolished.
“As time went on, it was harder and harder to go in there,” she said. “It was really emotional, you know, to go in there. So, we just left it.”
‘Almost like faith, right?’
Her mother died last fall. That’s when the family decided to put the property up for auction through Kiko, a family-owned business based in Canton.
Tabernik met Morsfield on auction day and quickly found herself rooting for him to win the building. When that didn’t happen, she was disappointed.
Then she learned about the lease deal.
“And I was like ‘no way,’” she said, laughing at the unexpected outcome. “I said, ‘Okay, then he’s gonna be successful.’ … He’s got the right attitude. He’s got the enthusiasm. He’s got the energy. You know, he’s perfect.”
She’s glad Morsfield is updating the space, painting pinstripes on the walls, getting rid of the old display cases and putting the Jeff’s Candy Shop name on the building.
Those changes are making it easier for her to move on.
“He’s on TikTok. He’s on Instagram. He’s on Facebook. … I think it’s great,” she said.
Tom Thielman, Willoughby’s economic development director, was already following Jeff’s Candy Shop on Instagram. There’s just something fun about Morsfield’s videos, where he walks viewers through the candy-making process, Thielman said.
He heard about how the lease deal happened from the new owner of the building.
“It was great,” Thielman said. “It was almost like faith, right?”
Willoughby is providing a $10,000 grant to help Morsfield spruce up the outside of the building and put up a new sign.
“The north end of our town has a great history, and Brandt’s was part of that since 1948,” Thielman said. “Nineteen-forty-eight, you know? A candy maker in that area. And we’re just so pleased that we can continue that for the next, hopefully, 25 or 50 years.”
Morsfield hopes to hold candy-making demonstrations at the new space, which has a large doorway between the shop and the kitchen. And he’s already thinking about ways to incorporate nods to the building’s history, from pictures in the store to new menu items.
“I’m a really big candymaker. They were really big chocolate people,” Morsfield said. “And so I want to be able to keep that chocolate-making going.”
Naso recently met up with Morsfield in person, after seeing his Instagram posts and reaching out. She walked through the old kitchen and shop before the renovations started.
So much of the space was just like she remembered it, frozen in time.
Now it’s changing.
“I love it,” she said. “And I think that my aunt and uncle would love it, too. … I think it’s probably a good thing that the next generation of candymakers takes it into the next 75 years.”
Michelle Jarboe is the business growth and development reporter at News 5 Cleveland. Follow her on X @MJarboe or email her at Michelle.Jarboe@wews.com.
