Jul 14, 2010

Bringing mom’s macaroons to the mass marketBy Michelle MironPressPubs.com

Shoreview, MN — The development of his first food-related business has been a sweet deal for Larry Shiller of Shoreview.

The 67-year-old entrepreneur has developed a brand of dark chocolate macaroon cookies named for his mother, whose maiden name was Lily Bloom, that he’s producing in Minneapolis and marketing internationally. The handmade coconut-filled treats will be featured on an episode of the Rachael Ray show set to air July 19, and Shiller expects annual sales to exceed $1 million within the next five years.

“I envision having our own retail outlets comparable to a small Godiva store,” he said. “I think this company has legs and can grow into something substantial. We have an excellent, quality product — one that people love.”

A native of West Palm Beach, Shiller graduated from the University of Miami with a degree in marketing. After a stint with retail chain Burdine’s in Florida, he move to the Twin Cities to work as a buyer with Dayton’s; three years later, he left the corporate world for a job as a fashion industry representative that lasted from 1970 to 1985. During that time he was also involved in two other business ventures; in 1981 he bought the event-planning business DayTours & CreativeEvents and in 1982 he and his late wife Nancy opened an Edina boutique called Nancy Lawrence that carried better large-sized women’s clothing. The boutique then became a chain that encompassed two stores in Minnesota and two in Arizona. While Shiller still runs the events business, the stores folded in the early ’90s due to what he calls “the disastrous effect” of the advent of the Mall of America.

He got the idea for Lily Bloom’s several years ago after noticing how much friends enjoyed gifts of his handmade macaroon cookies, a recipe developed by his late mother and handed down.

“We were all raised to be chocaholics in our house,” he remembered. “Mom never made a white or yellow cake. She used to joke that her epitaph would say ‘Poor Lil, all she could bake was one chocolate cake,’ but she made so much, much more than that and (macaroons) was a family favorite.”

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