"Get Happy Chocolatiers" Prepare for First Valentine's Day Rush

This Sunday is Valentine's Day and the National Retail Federation estimates U.S. consumers will spend nearly $20 billion on the holiday.

That's a lot of flowers and candy.

The good news is you still have more than enough time to get a gift together. You even have some new options for shopping spot including Get Happy Chocolatier - a new store that opened in Mequon about two months ago.

The location specializes in high-end chocolate – basically, it’s a step up from that random heart-shaped box you pick up from the drug store every year.

Get Happy Chocolatiers actually makes about 80-percent of their candies in-house. On Wednesday pecan turtles plunged through an enrober (the machine that coats candies in chocolate).

Watching over the process was the aptly titled chocolatier. That's Katie Beason. 

"We taste everything here for sure, to make sure everything is delicious before we send it out. Tempering the chocolate's a big thing to it has the pretty smooth color to it,” Beason said.

...and her boss?

"She loves candy. She comes in here and steals all of my candy that's being sent out for special orders,” Beason said.

Lindsay Erickson, the owner, talks like she eats chocolate for (or at least ‘with’) every meal…

"I happen to have it for breakfast just because I'm a serious sweet tooth,” Erickson said.

…and this is her first Valentine’s day at this location. The gummies are color coordinated...

"Cause I'm a little OCD,” Erickson said.

..and she's stocked for the holiday.

"So you've got the red hearts. That's made with dark chocolate. I would pair that with a Cabernet if you're going to do some wine. If you're going to do a milk chocolate maybe you could do a chardonnay,” Erickson said.

"So we have ginger hot lips as a truffle. We have some beautiful champagne truffles,” Erickson said. "Those are seasonal but we make them every week. So they're very fresh.”

“Then you have a distribution market a lot of chocolates are made much more in advance with preservatives to help the shelf-life. They may sit on the shelf 6-9 months sometimes,” Erickson said.

“Every week our chocolates get made, every week they get distributed,” Erickson said, speaking of the multiple locations the Mequon location now supplies across Southeastern Wisconsin and Illinois.

Get Happy’s Mequon store is planning to be open late on Friday, all day on Saturday, and they'll have extended hours on Sunday - Valentine's day - opening at 10 a.m.