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Archive | construction

July Update

July 27, 2012 by

It’s been busy around here at the chocolate factory! We’ve been a bit behind on posting updates to the blog, so here’s a quick catch up on everything that’s happened in the last few weeks.

First, we got a giant order for a conference. This is what 2,000 bars of chocolate (and a tiny box of extras) looks like stacked next to Cynthia.

It took us about 2 years of experimenting to make our first 10,000 bars, so it was a pretty big accomplishment for us to make 2,000 bars in about 10 days of long nights and weekends. This also forced us to streamline our process and now we are solidly making 1,000 bars a week. Even at this rate, though, we are still behind on our backlog but have some more ideas on how to scale up.

Next, we have two new machines in our chocolate-making line-up. First, a much larger Selmi tempering machine:

Unfortunately, because our chocolate has no added cocoa butter or emulsifiers, the machine does not work well with our chocolate and continually seizes up. Right now we are using it as a chocolate melter, but we’ve ordered an oversized motor which should be here in a few weeks. We’re hoping this will fix our tempering woes — right now this is the longest and hardest part of our process and we are looking forward to fixing it.

We also got a wrapping machine. I won’t say much here as this deserves a blog post (or series of blog posts) of it’s own. We had a lot of drama since it would not fit through our door. Here’s a photo of it all wrapped up while we figured out how to get it into the space:

Also, our container of beans from Madagascar arrived. These were the beans from Bertil’s farm that Cam and Alice visited last fall. The full container was 198 bags — half of which we shared with our friends Charley and Nicole. Most of the beans are in cold storage, but we have a small bean mountain in our space as we work through our bags:

And finally, our space on Valencia is starting to look more like a chocolate factory:

PS — you can find some new locations on our locations page: http://www.dandelionchocolate.com/locations/

Through the Looking-Glass

July 5, 2012 by

Now that construction is in full swing and the dust is (literally) flying everywhere, the new factory space is attracting a lot more attention from pedestrians. We didn’t have any signs up for a while, meaning that people have had to content themselves with speculating wildly on all of the commotion.

Well, now they don’t have to wonder any more—thanks to the creative energy and hard work of Sarah Henry! Sarah is a recently graduated high school senior from the Highland School in Warrenton, Virginia. She was out in San Francisco doing a senior internship project with Creativity Explored, a local organization in the Mission that provides artists with developmental disabilities the means and assistance necessary to express and support themselves through their art.

We took advantage of Sarah’s artistic sensibilities while she was in SF to help us with our new storefront windows. Sarah created four beautiful window designs based around our current and future packaging patterns. She did an absolutely amazing job, and we’re thrilled that she was able to find time in her schedule to work with us!

 

Preliminary sketches

 

Playing around with color

 

Works-in-Progress

 

Seeing Sarah (Thanks, Sarah!)

 

Looking good enough to eat

 

Caitlin approves!

 

Sarah will be starting university in the fall at the College of William & Mary, and we wish her the best in all of her future endeavors. You can see more of her artwork here. To learn more about Creativity Explored, please visit their website.

Construction Update – Weeks 3 & 4

May 22, 2012 by

The construction has been moving along steadily. For the last few weeks the focus has been on getting the plumbing and electrical under-floor work done. It’s the kind of thing that has to be done right, because once we pour the slab, it’s literally set in stone. We’ve passed our initial plumbing and electrical inspections, so the goal is to have a floor after the long weekend (so it has more time to set).

While the electrical and plumbing were getting installed, it was a big mess as lots of dirt had to be moved around:

The grease traps and rough-ins went in:

Lots of conduit for all of our machines and the cafe:

Once the inspections were done, the holes were filled back in, leaving a nice level ground:

And finally, we are starting to take a look at the roof and install the HVAC and vents!

Construction update – Week 2

May 10, 2012 by

Things are moving along quickly. Dirt’s flying and our plumber’s laid pipes with incredible attention to detail.

And, we found our own buried treasure- rubble from the 1906 earthquake!

We’re teaching Chocolate 101 again on May 31 at our production kitchen in the Dogpatch. There are still a few tickets available in our online store. I hope you can join us!

Construction update – Week 1!

April 30, 2012 by

There’s movement! We got our first update from our project manager, George, and our foreman, Ed, on Friday. The construction of our factory on Valencia Street is underway. We’ve been waiting a long time and it’s incredibly exciting to see the space start to come to life. We’ll keep you updated, but you can also check out all the photos on our flickr page.

We’re teaching Chocolate 101 again on May 31 at our production kitchen in the Dogpatch. There are still a few tickets available in our online store. I hope you can join us!

Building permit!

April 25, 2012 by

We got a bit of great news — we finally have our building permit! It’s been a long, hard road getting permits from the city, so we were thrilled when we got the okay to pick it up. This was the last step before we could start building the interior of our space.

George, our construction project manager, and I headed down to the building department to grab it in person. Of course, when we got there, it was missing a stamp and had been taken back into the system. We spent a good chunk of time scurrying between floors searching for the lost signatures. Finally they decided we were all good and let us stamp the plans! (That’s George above stamping each page).

As we’ve been waiting for this to happen, the construction crew was all ready to go, measuring and planning all of the plumbing:

And no groundbreaking would be complete without a photo of me holding a shovel looking like I just dug up a giant pile of rocks!

Special Delivery

February 29, 2012 by

One of the most common questions we get at farmer’s markets is “When will the space be ready??” We had originally thought our Valencia Street factory and cafe would be open over a year ago, but the city had other plans. In fact, the lease had been signed in October 2010 and the architectural plans done around the same time, but there were a series of permits we needed before we could begin any work.

Ron, our landlord, originally had an auto repair garage in the space and had to go through the process of converting the building. There are a couple steps in this process: 1) Change of Use permit, 2) Landlord’s work, 3) Our building permit, and 4) Our construction. The first step in this process took over 18 months — basically the Change of Use permit had to wend its way through the city’s process. Then Ron had to add the storefront, put up walls, sprinklers, pipes, and finish the shell of our space. Ron is now done with all of his work and permits. Cam and I stopped by to drop off the signed forms which means we are now at “delivery” and the space is finally ours!

We still have a long road ahead though; our building permit is still waiting on two departments: PUC and health. Once we get those approvals, we can actually start building the interior and hopefully get open in a few months. Thanks everyone for being patient on this journey with us!

Makin’ Plans

October 27, 2011 by

Ron, our landlord, has finally gotten the necessary approvals to complete his construction and move ahead with the build-out for our space. That means it’s time for us to start getting our plans in order and submit for building permits. Since it’s been a year since we designed the space — and we’ve learned a lot since then — we are now going through the plans outlet by outlet, duct by duct, in one final pass. It’s a lot of work, 62 pages in all, but we’re excited for this next step!

312 notice

June 20, 2011 by

We’re inching along in the construction process. Last week, our 312 notice went up in the window of 740 Valencia. Assuming no one in the neighborhood objects to the change of use of our space, we can submit for our next round of permits next month. This means we’re one step closer to build out!