Business

The Work We Do: Christian Vergara, Sweet Cart Candy Shoppe

My name is Christian Vergara. I’m the manager here at Sweet Cart Candy Shoppe located in Wading River, N.Y.

Basically my main focus when I’m here is making the customer happy, making this experience as memorable as possible.

That also includes refilling candies, making sure the merchandise looks as great as possible for every customer that comes in here.

This was a lifelong dream of my father’s. He took a stroll through the Shoppes and realized this is kind of the perfect setting for a candy shop. He saw the carousel, he saw the beauty of it and thought that this would fit. We’re here today after that whimsical dream.

My favorite part really with it is seeing the smiles on people’s faces or when they come in here and they look at some of the nostalgic candy that we have and they reminisce: ‘Oh my gosh, I used to go to the candy store with my grandpa, my father, my mother.’

And also the young kids of today get to experience this candy shop.

We carry a lot of nostalgic items that a lot of people haven’t seen in many years: Zagnut bars, Chuckles, we have Satellite Wafers, even Bottlecaps. Tons of items that bring people back to when they went to candy shops back in the day.

Of course, we do have current candies that are popular: M&M’s and Swedish Fish are one of the most popular, Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups. We also carry fudge, macarons, gourmet chocolate, stuff that you can’t get everywhere.

A family business is a lot of fun. It’s very personal and everybody here is very attached to it and sees it as almost like our baby. It actually brings us together as a family because we get to do things and see how each other work and work together towards a common goal.

We think that gives us an advantage in a way because we get to connect to our customers on that kind of level where we’re in the same community.

We think we have a great shop here and there’s nothing really bad about a piece of candy or two.

“The Work We Do” is a News-Review multimedia project profiling workers around Riverhead Town. It is made possible by Peconic Landing in Greenport. See more photos on Instagram @riverheadnewsreview