Linda's Lollies - the Original Premium Gourmet Lollipop - Re-Launches with a New Company, New Flavors and a You Only Live Once Attitude

MAHWAH, N.J., Aug. 14, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- Linda's Lollies, the original premium gourmet lollipop brand, is being reimagined for a new generation of lollipop lovers. Linda's Lollies is now part of Yolo Candy, founded in 2012 by three former senior executives of The Topps Company, Inc., who bring a shared passion of creating innovative candy products that deliver unique and delicious eating experiences.

In 2012, Yolo Candy acquired Linda's Lollies, a brand introduced by industry pioneer Linda Harkavy almost 30 years ago and built on the premise of offering the highest quality lollipops in a variety of exotic flavors. With the recent introduction of similar products, Yolo set out to distinguish Linda's Lollies from the competition and reinforce its position as the pre-eminent gourmet lollipop brand. That effort began by creating an optimized assortment of 24 new gourmet flavors, including intriguing new taste concepts such as Mango Chile, Blueberry Muffin and Maple Pancake. Each flavor has been specially crafted to deliver superior flavor intensity and accuracy.

New thought was given to the appearance of Linda's Lollies which now come in a variety of interesting color combinations: bright translucent, opaque, swirled and half-splits, all on a unique purple plastic stick, making these new pops look as good as they taste. Linda's nostalgic packaging has been updated to project its premium positioning and strong branding. Even the wraps have been re-engineered to feature a notch for easy opening, eliminating the difficulty consumers experience when trying to open twist-wrapped lollipops. The final step in pop perfection has been to develop a range of new display solutions that enable retailers to merchandise Linda's in a variety of impulse locations. With these significant, consumer-targeted improvements in taste, design, and display, Linda's Lollies once again distinguishes itself from the competition as the highest quality gourmet lollipop in the world.

Yolo Candy's executives are no strangers to creating popular brands. The company was founded by three veteran candy industry professionals, who collectively have more than 55 years of experience in creating, marketing and selling world-wide popular candy brands. The executives are:

Scott Silverstein, Yolo Candy founder & CEO
Scott Silverstein is the former CEO of The Topps Company, Inc., a multi-national corporation best known for its Bazooka bubble gum and Topps trading cards. Mr. Silverstein oversaw the Topps worldwide confectionary, Sports and Entertainment businesses and has more than 20 years of experience in marketing, new product development, sourcing, and licensing.   

John Budd, Yolo Candy chief marketing officer
John Budd is the former Vice President of Marketing for The Topps Company, Inc., where he was responsible for Brand and New Product Development, Quality Assurance and Packaging. He has spent more than 15 years in the confections industry and 25+ years in kids' marketing. Budd is the architect of the best-selling children's candy brands: Ring Pop, Push Pop, Baby Bottle Pop and Juice Drop Pop.

Brent Greer, Yolo Candy chief sales officer
Brent Greer is the former Vice President of Sales & Customer Marketing at The Topps Company, Inc. He has more than 20 years of experience in the confections industry having worked at both Topps and M&M Mars. For 10+ years he's managed top-to-top relationships with key retailers and confectionery brokers and is a pioneer of kid's candy category management in the U.S. retail space.

Linda's Lollies are just the beginning for Yolo Candy, which was founded to build a portfolio of confectionery brands that excite and delight kids as well as folks who are simply young-at-heart. With the company's spirit of "You Only Live Once" in mind, the founders are working on a number of innovative concepts that deliver a unique combination of great taste, engaging interaction and "wow" factor that will be the hallmark of all Yolo products.

For more information about Yolo Candy or Linda's Lollies go to http://www.yolocandy.com, http://lindaslollies.com, email [email protected] or call 201.252.8765.

SOURCE Yolo Candy