In Jericho, Vermont, there’s a chocolate shop where the same family has been showing up to work for 40 years. Bob and Martha Pollack started Snowflake Chocolates in their own home, and today four generations of the family are involved. Bob is 86 years old and still spends roughly 60 hours a week at the shop during the busy season, hand-rolling candy the way he learned growing up.
His father was a Pittsburgh steelworker who made sweets on the side, and Bob found those old recipes in a file cabinet after a career in banking. Martha picked the shop’s name to honor Snowflake Bentley, the Jericho resident who famously photographed snowflakes. The family is honest about the hard parts, too. They say they argue plenty, but the business keeps running and they’re still family when the day ends.
That mix of patience and persistence is something a lot of Suncoast families understand, whether you run a beachside cafe, a bait shop, or a citrus stand passed down through the years. Handmade takes longer. Family makes it complicated. And somehow that’s exactly what keeps people coming back for decades. Have you ever worked with a family member? Tell us how it went in the comments.
