New York Candy Stores Thrive Despite Economic Uncertainty

With U.S. consumer confidence at historic lows, it is a difficult period for retailers across the country. But in and around New York City, one niche sector is expanding — candy stores.

 Economy Candy, which was opened in 1937, continues to thrive to this day. (Photo: Jim.henderson, Wikimedia Commons)

Mitchell Cohen, the third-generation owner of Economy Candy on Manhattan’s Lower East Side, has a theory: people will still buy candy — or sweets, as they are known in British English — when economic times are tough, Alexis Benveniste reported for BBC News.

“The dollar isn’t going as far these days,” he said. “Inflation, uncertainty, all that, but there’s always candy.”

The business, the oldest candy store in New York, first opened in 1937 toward the end of the Great Depression.

Initially, it operated as a hat and shoe repair shop, with candy sold from a cart out front as an additional source of income. But people could not afford repairs, Cohen said, prompting his grandfather to shift entirely to selling affordable sweets.

Eighty-nine years later, Economy Candy continues to thrive.

While the latest official data show that U.S. retail sales are still growing — up 4.9 percent in April from the same month last year — consumer sentiment in the U.S. hit a new all-time low in May, according to a closely watched report.

Echoing Cohen’s view, Kate Bolger said candy remains accessible because of its low price point and “everyone can partake” despite financial pressures.

Next month, she is set to open The Village Confectionery in Sleepy Hollow, a Hudson Valley town 28 miles north of New York City that is best known as the setting of the 19th-century horror story The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.