New candy store sets up shop in downtown Copperas Cove

By BRITTANY FHOLER
Cove Leader-Press 

Copperas Cove has a new candy store in town offering penny candies and other sweets, just like in the old days. 
Located at 214 S. 2nd Street, Snacks By the Pound offers a variety of sweet delightful treats and snacks at budget friendly prices. 
Owned by Tiffani Carter-Wesley, the name of the store is a nod to candy stores back in Carter-Wesley’s home state of Pennsylvania. 
She said that the store there had penny candy and snacks, which she wanted to offer here in Texas. While deciding what to do with the storefront, Carter-Wesley thought about what she could offer, and with the guidance of friends and family, she came to the decision to open her candy store. 
Carter-Wesley and her husband moved to Texas around six years ago with their four children. Two have graduated from Copperas Cove High School, and the other two are currently attending the high school. Carter-Wesley said that Copperas Cove offered a better opportunity for her family compared to their previous home in Pennsylvania. 
After moving to Copperas Cove, Carter-Wesley started her first business, Illuminate Beauty Bar, which is a salon located at 1606 E. Bus. 190 in Copperas Cove. The candy store is her second business. 
“I have grown as a hairstylist, and that helped me open this, so I didn’t get a loan or anything,” Carter-Wesley said. “I used my proceeds from there to open my business. I really, really love the salon, and I’ve fallen in love with the candy store. I come in here sometimes and just look around, and I’ll be so proud that God has blessed me with this building because I’m like this was what it should have been all along.”
Carter-Wesley said she wanted to offer penny candies just like the stores in her home state did, but the penny candy offerings are only a part of all that Snacks By the Pound has to offer. 
The penny candy baskets hang along the wall from the front door along the hallway to the back of the storefront. Customers will grab a bag for the penny candy and can select their variety themselves. The types of candy available for a penny a piece range from tootsie rolls, Tootsie fruit chews, Krabby Patty gummies, Mint Patties and tons more.
Snacks By the Pound also offers movie theater box candy for $1 and various sweet and sour candies like Airhead, Sour Punch Strawz and more. One of the store’s best-selling items is the cotton candy, which comes in different flavors in 2-ounce plastic containers for just $1. There are also 10-cent candy options. 
The store’s second room holds the snack items like Skinny Popcorn, chips, crackers, cookies and more, as well as 25-cent packs of Haribo gummy bears. 
“We’re in our fifth week since opening, and we’re doing pretty good,” Carter-Wesley said. “It’s word of mouth so people are coming and trying us out.”
Opening during the pandemic has been a bit challenging, she added. The main challenges are with what items can be sold. For hygienic reasons, Snacks By the Pound does not sell loose, unpackaged items like jelly beans or other bulk candy that the customer would normally bag themselves. 
Snacks By the Pound does sell candy items that have been packaged in plastic sandwich bags by staff, following food safety protocols, like the peach gummy rings and Swedish Fish, etc. 
Carter-Wesley is diabetic, but she said her favorite candy that she offers are the chewy caramel squares wrapped in clear plastic. She said she is going to also begin offering another of her favorite candy called Frooties, which are fruit flavored taffy chews similar to the Tootsie Fruit Chews, found in her home state of Pennsylvania. 
She said she does not currently offer sugar-free candies but plans to look into offering options for those with special dietary needs. She said that this will be more challenging because the candy will likely have to be specially ordered instead of bought in bulk at local stores. 
“It’s been fun doing the business, because we don’t have a candy store in Cove right now, so now we do, and I’m just hoping to reach honestly everybody but more or less the children because they don’t really have things that they can do,” Carter-Wesley said.
Snacks By the Pound does have a room in the store where kids can play games or pass time while they wait for their family members to finish shopping. 
Carter-Wesley said she plans to hold activities geared towards kids in the summer, and she wants to partner with other businesses in the area and hold a fun day in the summer geared at bringing the community together. 
Snacks By the Pound offers candy arrangements, ranging in size and ranging in price from $1 to $10. They are currently offering arrangements for Mother’s Day. They take special requests as well for the person who loves just chocolate or just a specific type of candy. Special requests require a five day turn around period. 
Carter-Wesley said that she wanted to make sure her prices remained affordable. 
“It’s just like I am in the salon,” Carter-Wesley said. “A lot of people feel like because we’re in a military town that people have the income, but not everybody is military. I’m certainly not, and so you want to keep stuff at a lower price so people can say, ‘Oh, I can afford to take my children to get a couple pieces of candy, just because they did well on a test or whatever.’ Not everybody just has that kind of money.” 
She added that she made sure to check out other candy stores in Austin and nearby to look at their pricing and found them to be more expensive. 
Carter-Wesley said she was glad to open her business in downtown Copperas Cove, and she looks forward to the foot traffic that the weekly Farmer’s Markets can bring. 
Carter-Wesley said that some of the traffic in her candy store has been from clients from the nearby businesses. 
“All of this is just great,” Carter-Wesley said. “We as partners and kind of living on the same pace, we should be supporting each other.”
Snacks By the Pound is open Monday through Friday, 10 a.m. to 7 p.m., and Saturdays and Sundays, from 12 p.m. to 5 p.m. The store phone number is 254-408-0564. Snacks By the Pound accepts cash and Cash App forms of payment only.