Company type | Private |
---|---|
Industry | Bakery |
Founded | March 1983 |
Founder | Matt and Lori Nader |
Headquarters | , United States |
Area served | Midwestern United States, primarily Greater Cincinnati, Kansas City, Kansas; online to the United States and Canada [1] |
Products | Gourmet cookies |
Owners | Donna Drury-Heine, Robert Heine |
Parent | The Blue Chip Cookie Company, Inc |
Website | www |
The Blue Chip Cookie Company is an American gourmet cookie licensor and e-commerce gourmet cookie businesses with headquarters in Milford, Ohio, United States, and store locations in Ohio, Kansas, and Kentucky. Founded in March 1983 by the Nader family (Matt Nader died in 1997), Blue Chip Cookies specializes in gourmet cookies and cookie cakes and created the first white chocolate macadamia cookie. [2]
The first Blue Chip Cookies store opened in March 1983 on Beach Street (Fisherman's Wharf) in San Francisco, California. [3] [4] In 1986, the company began franchising stores in selected markets. In 1987, Blue Chip Cookies developed National Cookie Day as an annual promotion on December 4. [5]
In 1986, Blue Chip Cookies opened a store in Cincinnati, Ohio, a result of the city's efforts to market its nickname, "Blue Chip City". [6] [7] In 1998, Blue Chip Cookies was purchased by Edgewood, Kentucky–based B.C.C. Enterprises, a rare example of a franchisee that had grown larger than the franchisor. [6] A privately held Loveland, Ohio–based company, acquired Blue Chip Cookies in November 2005 and opened a new store in Loveland in June 2006. In January 2007, Blue Chip Cookie Company, Inc resumed franchising and licensing. [8] [9]
In 2007, Blue Chip Cookies focused their attention on driving the online e-commerce business and corporate cookie gifts/marketing by opening an online store. The 3,000-square-foot (280 m2) commissary facility for online, corporate gifts and corporate headquarters is based in Milford, Ohio, and have found the strategic decision was instrumental in the overall creation of a new business channel. In addition, Blue Chip Cookies special niche is corporate gifts and marketing initiatives. The company promotes its products as corporate and holiday cookie gifts.
The Blue Chip Cookie Company, Inc is now licensing the brand, to include the proprietary recipes, to select retailers across the United States. This is a change from their franchising model.
Loveland is a city in Hamilton, Clermont, and Warren counties in the southwestern part of the U.S. state of Ohio. The population was 13,307 at the 2020 census. Considered part of the Cincinnati metropolitan area, Loveland is located near exit 52 off Interstate 275, about 15 miles (24 km) northeast of the Cincinnati city limits. It borders Symmes, Miami and Hamilton townships and straddles the Little Miami River. Once a busy railroad town, Loveland is now a major stop along the Little Miami Scenic Trail.
Macy's, Inc. is an American holding company of department stores. Upon its establishment in 1929, Federated held ownership of the regional department store chains Abraham & Straus, Lazarus, Filene's, and Shillito's. Bloomingdale's joined Federated Department Stores the next year. Throughout its early history, frequent acquisitions and divestitures saw the company operate a number of nameplates. In 1994, Federated took over Macy's, the old department store chain originally founded in 1858 by American entrepreneur Rowland Hussey Macy. Despite Federated's long history of preserving regional nameplates, its acquisition of the May Department Stores Company in 2005 marked the end of those nameplates. By the following year, both the Macy's and Bloomingdale's brands had replaced them nationwide. Ultimately, Federated itself was renamed Macy's, Inc. in 2007, an acknowledgment of the old store's venerable name.
The Little Miami River is a Class I tributary of the Ohio River that flows 111 miles (179 km) through five counties in southwestern Ohio in the United States. The Little Miami joins the Ohio River east of Cincinnati. It forms parts of the borders between Hamilton and Clermont counties and between Hamilton and Warren counties. The Little Miami River is one of 156 American rivers designated by the U.S. Congress or the Secretary of the Interior as a National Wild and Scenic River and lends its name to the adjacent Little Miami Scenic Trail.
Cincinnati Bell, Inc., doing business as Altafiber, is a regional telecommunications service provider based in Cincinnati, Ohio, United States. It provides landline telephone, fiber-optic Internet, and IPTV services through its subsidiaries Altafiber Home Phone and Hawaiian Telcom, which are the incumbent local exchange carriers for the Greater Cincinnati metropolitan area and Hawaii. Other subsidiaries provide enterprise information technology services and long distance calling.
President's Choice or PC is a line of grocery products and services offered by the Canada-based Loblaw Companies Ltd.
Graeter's is a regional ice cream chain based in Cincinnati, Ohio. Founded in 1870 by Louis C. Graeter, the company has since expanded to 56 retail locations selling ice cream, candy and baked goods in the Midwestern United States. It further distributes its ice cream to 6,000 stores throughout the country. As of 2017, the company had 1,050 employees and $60 million in revenue.
LaRosa's Pizzeria is a chain of pizzerias serving neighborhoods throughout Ohio, Kentucky, and Indiana. It was founded in 1954 by Donald "Buddy" LaRosa, along with partners Richard "Muzzie" Minella, Mike Soldano and Frank "Head" Serraino. Originally called Papa Gino's, LaRosa later bought out his partners, and changed the name to LaRosa's.
Payless ShoeSource Worldwide, LLC, is an American multinational discount footwear chain. Established in 1956 by cousins Louis and Shaol Pozez, Payless was a privately held company owned by Blum Capital, and Golden Gate Capital. In 1961, it became a public company as the Volume Shoe Corporation, which merged with The May Department Stores Company in 1979. In the 1980s, Payless was widely known in the U.S. for its Pro Wings line of discount sneakers, which often had Velcro straps instead of laces. In 1996, Payless became an independent publicly held company. In 2004, Payless announced it would exit the Parade chain and would close 100 Payless Shoe outlets. On August 17, 2007, the company acquired the Stride Rite Corporation and changed its name to Collective Brands, Inc. As of 2020, Payless is owned by a group of investors led by Alden Global Capital and Axar Capital Management.
Mrs. Fields' Original Cookies Inc. is an American franchisor in the snack food industry, with Mrs. Fields and TCBY as its core brands. Through its franchisees' retail stores, it is one of the largest retailers of freshly-baked-on-premises specialty cookies and brownies in the United States and the largest retailer of soft-serve frozen yogurt in the country. In addition, it operates a gifts and branded retail business, entering into many licensing arrangements. Its franchise systems include over 300 franchised and licensed locations throughout the United States and in 22 other countries. It also offers retail grocery products and a gifting catalog under the name of Mrs. Fields Gifts. It is headquartered in Broomfield, Colorado.
Loveland High School is a public high school located in Loveland, Ohio, United States, within Hamilton County. It is the only high school in the Loveland City School District, serving the communities of Loveland, Symmes Township, Goshen Township, and Miami Township. It offers a range of educational programs, including college preparatory and vocational.
The Cincinnati metropolitan area is a large, three-state media market centered on Cincinnati, Ohio, slightly overlapping the Dayton media market to the north. The Cincinnati market is served by one daily newspaper, The Cincinnati Enquirer, and a variety of weekly and monthly print publications. The area is home to 12 television stations and numerous radio stations. The E. W. Scripps Company was founded in Cincinnati as a newspaper chain and remains there as a national television and radio broadcaster. The term "soap opera" originally referred to Cincinnati-based Procter & Gamble, which created some of the first programs in this genre.
Bernard Heinrich "Henry" Kroger was an American businessman who created the Kroger chain of supermarkets. Kroger was a pioneering grocery innovator who introduced self-service shopping to the public in 1895. He allowed customers to enter his stores, shop with prices clearly marked on every item, and take the merchandise home themselves instead of waiting for a delivery.
Great American Cookie Co., doing business as Great American Cookies, is an American chain of independently owned and operated franchised stores that specialize in gourmet cookies, especially cookie cakes. It has over 290 stores in the U.S., particularly in the Southeast as well as Puerto Rico and Guam, most commonly located in malls. The company was founded in 1977 and has its headquarters in Atlanta. It is since 2010 a franchise brand in the portfolio of Global Franchise Group.
Hickory Farms, LLC is an American food gift retailer with headquarters in Chicago. Richard Ransom established the company in 1951 when he began selling handcrafted cheese at local fairs. By 1959, the company added summer sausage and opened its first retail store in Maumee, Ohio. By 1981, it operated over 1,000 Hickory Farms stores and seasonal kiosks open in the United States and Canada.
Gimmee Jimmy's Cookies was founded in 1983 in West Orange, New Jersey, United States, by Jimmy Libman. Born deaf, Libman overcame his "disability" to run the cookie company by himself for more than 20 years. To supplement his work, Libman hired other deaf workers, offering them a place to hone their skills, and showing everyone that being deaf is not a limitation on success.
H. Salt Esq. Fish & Chips is a restaurant chain specializing in British-style fish and chips, founded by Haddon Salt in Sausalito, California, in 1965. Salt followed his father and grandfather in becoming a master fish cook and entrepreneur.
Tire Discounters is a tire and auto service shop started by Chip Wood in 1976 in Cincinnati, Ohio. Today, it ranks as the eighth-largest independent tire dealer in the U.S. by Modern Tire Dealer National Rankings 2020.
Merle Norman Cosmetics Inc. or simply known as Merle Norman, is an American cosmetics company that manufactures skin care, personal care, and makeup products founded in 1931 by Merle Norman. The company sells its products through e-commerce and its beauty store studio franchises, along with operating day spas through its Merle Norman Spa brand. As of 2021 the company had 1,007 locations throughout 7 countries, primarily in North America.
Crumbl Cookies is a franchise chain of bakeries in the United States and Canada that specializes in cookies. Based in Utah, it was founded in 2017. As of August 2024, the company has 862 stores across the United States. The chain maintains a strong presence in social media, to which The New York Times has attributed the business' growth.