I took a little hiatus in order to deal with some personal stuff. All is well on the shutterbug front....just very very busy.
Today I'll be discussing the 2015 Hammonds Candy Factory Annual Candy Cane Festival. Hammonds is located at 5735 Washington St in Denver, CO. Year-round, they offer free tours of the factory where you can actually watch candy being made. On our spring/summer visit in 2012, we got to see candy ribbon being made. On this particular visit, during the festival, they were already making Easter bunnies!!! We also found out that most of the cotton candy that is distributed in grocery stores (even if it doesn't say Hammonds) is actually made in the Hammonds factory. Hammonds personally packs and packages each package of candy instead of just having a conveyor belt and machine that does it all. Every member of the staff I've met is fantastic, super sweet and very knowledgeable.
The Candy Cane Festival is held annually on a December weekend (Friday and Saturday) at the Hammonds Factory. Admission is free and most of the festivities are included with that free admission. This year, the only paid parts were professional pictures of Santa (if you wanted to take your own pictures, it was free) and the crafts tent. Tickets were extremely reasonable ($2) to do the paid events. Offered at no cost? Meeting Santa and Mrs Claus (which on Saturday included a large tasty Hammonds Candy Cane), bounce houses and slides, free cotton candy, free games that had toys or tasty rewards like Hammonds taffy, horse drawn carriage rides, free hot cocoa, trolley rides, mini tours of the factory and more!
As always, the staff was great. They braved a very, very cold snowy day in order to make everyone's experiences great. There were heat posts available to warm up and some of the activities were in tents to get a reprieve from the cold. We got there very early on Saturday and the lines were virtually non-existent. As we were getting ready to leave, some of the lines appeared long BUT moved very quickly. For example, mini tours had a long line but people are let in to the touring area in groups so the line moved quickly forward. The line for the carriage rides got a little long but a nice big group can fit on the carriage so the line moved quickly. We didn't stand in line for anything for longer than 5-10 minutes.
The tasty treats offered as "samples" or prizes are second to none. Hammonds candies are absolutely delicious. I'm a big fan of the candy bars, particularly the one that has dark chocolate and mint (though these were not one of the items given away, they are very reasonably priced and well worth it). The taffy and cotton candy are absolutely delicious and the candy canes are wonderful. Even the hot cocoa was fantastic complete with a delicious homemade marshmallow and a peppermint stick stirring stick. Hammonds definitely delivers on quality and taste!
The location is incredibly easy to find. Take a quick jaunt off I-25 and you're there. Admittedly, parking was a bit of a nightmare. The parking lot of the factory holds the festival so most of the parking is reliant on surrounding businesses. I saw one surrounding business charging $15 for parking which, I think, chased a few people off but rest assured, folks...most of the surrounding businesses don't gouge you like that. I'd also like to point out that some of the festival staff was helping to direct traffic for parking. I was snuggled into a tight spot and had someone actually come over and guide me out to make sure that I got out safely. I heard people griping about the parking and would love to point out that when you attend a free event, there will be hiccups and you should be thankful to have just a weird parking situation as the only issue. I might suggest parking down the road or across the street and just walking over to avoid the parking situation.
Overall, I would completely recommend this festival! It's an incredible free event by an incredible, giving company. We will definitely be attending again in the future. #HammondsCandies
