True Confections Moves And Expands To Concord's Loudon Road

CONCORD, NH — A local candy shop has moved to new digs on Loudon Road while also expanding its offerings to customers. After more than 27 years at the Steeplegate Mall, True Confections, often referred to as "the candy store in the mall," moved into the former Office Suite café space a few weeks ago. The shop – purchased by retirees Paul and Sue Foskitt a few years ago – is more than two and half times the size of its former space and now offers coffee, ice cream, and gifts.

Paul Foskitt said the decision wasn't an easy one, especially for an established business. But Loudon Road is a busy drag and the mall – like many across the country – is in decline, despite attempting to make changes, he said.

"The foot traffic within the mall was rapidly decreasing," he said. "And, unfortunately, the current landlord doesn't have a plan in place – or, at least a plan in place that he's willing to share with the tenants – and they seemed to be unwilling to negotiate on the perceived value of the space over there."

The Foskitts had previously been in the manufacturing business – constructing industrial mixers for food and cosmetics – for about a quarter of a century as well as working in real estate. Buying the candy store was kind of an accident. While entrepreneurial, they always wanted to try owning a retail business. When they saw the store for sale and met, Ginger Card – who has been with True Confections for 20 years – they fell in love with both.

"We saw many, many different avenues which we could improve the store," Paul Foskitt said. "We had a lot of good thoughts right off so we decided to give it a whirl and have been having a ton of fun with it, meeting a lot of nice people."

Some of those improvements include serving coffee roasted in New Hampshire and ice cream from Memories out of Kingston. Gifts from New Hampshire are also on display including soy candles and puzzles. More candy offerings, too, are available in the larger space, about 9,000 lbs. of it. There is also seating inside, too.

True Confections has been in the new location for two weeks and they couldn't be happier about the move. The new landlord – the Hodges Companies, they noted – was helpful in making the move efficient. The store was only closed during the transition for a few days.

On Sunday, June 23, they will be having a grand opening. True Confections' website is http://trueconfectionsnh.com/.

Got a business news tip? Send it to Tony Schinella at tony.schinella@patch.com.