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Today, we're puckering up for the sweet to sour history of Jelly Belly
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In 1869, Gustav Goerlitz started a confectionary company in Belleville, Illinois. But he was wiped out by the economic panic of 1893 and had to sell the business to cover his debts
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And his son Adolf restarted the business once the candy market came back
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That restarted business finally hit its stride when it started producing candy corn
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Inspired by the success Adolf was having, Gustav's other son, Hermann, headed to Oakland, California
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And in 1922, he founded the Hermann Gerlitz Candy Company. Fast forward to 1959, and Hermann's grandson, Hermann Rowland Sr., took over his granddad's company
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adding a few new products to his life, including jelly beans. In 1976, candy and nut distributor David Klein stood on the shoulders of jelly bean giants
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and developed a new version of the Gurlitz Mini Jelly Bean, using natural flavors
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Klein partnered up with Gurlitz to mass-produce his creation, which he named Jelly Belly
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in honor of blues musician Huddy William Ledbetter, famously known as Lead Belly
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Klein sold his interest in Jelly Belly to the Gurlitz Company in 1980
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for about $5 million, around $18 million in 2024. Before he was president of the United States
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Ronald Reagan smoked pipes, but he decided he needed to nix the habit
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That where the jelly beans come in Rowland heard about Reagan struggle with tobacco and had some mini jelly beans sent over to the future 40th president The result was that right around 1966 Reagan got over his tobacco addiction
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and became addicted to mini jelly beans instead. By 1973, he was writing the manufacturer letters
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to personally tell them that it's gotten to the point where we can hardly start a meeting
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or make a decision without passing around a jar of jelly beans. 2001 was the year that the two Gurlitz candy companies
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finally merged into one, the Jelly Belly Candy Company. By 2008, a full 85% of their sales were Jelly Bellies
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In 2022, David Klein, the guy who actually invented Jelly Bellies, sued the company in federal court
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He claimed the Jelly Belly people were trying to rewrite the history and origin of the Jelly Belly jelly bean
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Jelly Belly countersued Klein for falsely calling himself the founder of the Jelly Belly Candy Company
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which, as you recall, was created from the companies founded by the Gerlitz family
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As of 2024, the suits have yet to be resolved. Today, Jelly Belly is a global corporation
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with distribution in 80 countries. At the same time, it's still a family business
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run by Lisa Rowland Brasher, the great-great-granddaughter of founder Gustav Gerlitz. It makes over 100 different flavors of jelly bean
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and it manufactures an eye-popping 1,680 jelly beans per second, and they sell an estimated 15 billion of them a year
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And conservatively, we'd guess around 10 billion of them are sold to the Ronald Reagan estate
