Bakery to Host Fundraiser for Cancer Patients

Susansnaps, the area’s only gourmet gingersnap cookie company, will host Sweets for Smiles, a fundraiser for cancer patients, Friday and Saturday at its store in Sandy Springs.

All proceeds from the sale of Susansnap Spice Cake Slices ($4) and gingersnap Snack Packs ($5.50) will be donated to the Susan Carver Foundation, which provides funds for cancer research. For every $2 raised, a bag of gingersnaps will be given to cancer patients going through treatment during the Christmas holidays. Ginger is a natural stomach soother.

The store is located at 229 Hilderbrand Drive, and hours are 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Friday and 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Saturday. Year-round, 10 percent of the store’s proceeds are donated to cancer patients.

Susan Robbins, who was named after her aunt, Susan Carver, who died in 1977 from Hodgkin’s disease, had the same cancer but has been free of the disease for five years. She and her mother, Laura Stachler, own Susansnaps, which was started as a home business in 2005. It was inspired by Ms. Stachler’s joy of cooking and an effort to give her daughter soothing cookies while going through cancer treatments. The store opened in December, and this is Susansnaps’ first fundraiser since opening the store.

“We felt like we saw a need,” Ms. Stachler said. “A lot of people don’t know what to do or what to give. … It’s a lovely way to remember people and it’s an easy way for the whole community to give back. Just with $2 we’re trying to help these patients. … We’re not trying to save the world, but we know this one small gesture will help these patients.”

Ms. Robbins added, “[Cancer patients] actually really just love getting something fun for five minutes that takes time away from something serious. We do share our story on the packaging and it’s unbelievably nice that patients call us, e-mail us or even come by the store to say thank you for bringing them gifts. They also know they’re not forgotten at such a difficult time.”

She also said cancer patients were grateful when she and her mother have delivered them cookies in the past.

“A good cookie makes everybody a little bit happy,” Ms. Robbins said. “When we walked into the cancer centers last year, people’s faces instantly lit up.”

By Hope S. Philbrick

Snap to It! Mother-Daughter Baking Team Settles into a Brick-and Mortar-Storefront
Susansnaps, a gourmet ginger snap cookie company, grew from a tummy-comforting snack into a mother-daughter business that recently opened its first retail location in Sandy Springs. Laura Stachler (who previously owned Laura’s Divine Desserts) first developed Susansnaps as snacks for her husband and daughter Susan Robbins, who were undergoing chemotherapy treatments within the same year. While Laura perfected the recipe, Susan designed logos and packaging. The ginger snaps became popular and took over Laura’s small baking company. They are named Susansnaps in memory of Laura’s sister Sue (who died from Hodgkin’s in 1977 at age 28) and in honor of her daughter Susan (who beat Hodgkin’s at age 22). For the past five years, the mother and daughter have worked out of a commercial kitchen and grown the business beyond their wildest dreams. Fans of Susansnaps include Martha Stewart, Rachel Ray and Chef Bobby Flay. The Sunday Paper asked the women to share more details.

Was a retail location always part of your business plan?

Laura: Actually not. We had a really nice online business, attended gift shows, had corporate clients. The customers really let us know they’d like a place where they could come to us to pick up products directly. Last spring, we started looking for a location.

Susan: It’s really nice to create more of a shopping experience. Rather than place orders or call, people can come in, look around and get a personal touch.

What are your products? What’s most popular?

Laura: On the ginger snap side, we offer the original Susansnaps, plus delicious citrus and cocoa snaps. We have seven different made-from-scratch layer cakes in a variety of flavors. We also have spiced nuts and treats. Everything is made in the shop by us.

We have a divine chocolate fudge cake. The recipe for our banana nut cake has been in the family for more than 60 years. Susan and I came up with a Susansnap spice cake with a fabulous lemon cream cheese frosting that’s surprised us in that it’s become our very biggest seller. It’s got five spices on the bottom and a fresh, tangy lemon zest on top. Even chocoholics are over the top about it.

How did you develop the original Susansnaps?

Laura: Oh gosh, we worked at that for a long time. The inspiration was that ginger is a natural stomach soother, and at that time, that was the purpose we wanted for it. Little did we know the little treat would be so huge. It’s got a little crunch on the outside, texture on the inside, and gets rave reviews.

Susan: Our first big order was for 30,000 cookies. We hand scooped all of them, which took a couple weeks. Now we do 8,000 a day. At the beginning, we never could have imagined growing this much. We never set out to be where we are.

You also founded the Susan Carver Foundation?

Susan: Yes, 10 percent of sales go to cancer research and patient gifts. We donate bags of cookies to cancer patients in local hospitals during the holidays. SP

Susansnaps is located at 229 Hilderbrand Dr., Sandy Springs. www.susansnaps.com.

By Carol Miemi

Family Travails Sparks Susansnaps

A Dunwoody mother and daughter recently turned family tragedy into triumph when they opened Susansnaps – a bakery and sweetshop they own and run together.

Walk through the door of their business, and you are in pure confection. From the hand-painted walls, floors and furniture to the aroma of gingersnaps that fills the air, the look and feel are of an old-fashioned 1940s sweet shop combined with the stylish flair of sophisticated upscale graphic design.

On the walls of the bright little shop are giant stripes and polka dots of red, white and black. The vintage look is enhanced by the round oilcloth floor covering in the center of the shop, painted in tiny multi-colored dots. Upon this mat rests a stack of round flea-market tables, painted in white and decorated to look like a giant three-tiered wedding cake. A shelf along one wall is adorned by a row of hatboxes, fancifully decorated to look like all the scrumptious cakes made by the ladies of Susansnaps.

Other tables and shelves display the thematic packaging in which the gingersnaps are available – maternity, babies, holidays, get-well and cancer therapy.

And here is where the story actually begins. Laura Carver Stachler and her daughter, Susan Robbins, had more than just a love of sweets in mind when they opened Susansnaps.

In 1977, Laura’s sister, Susan, died of Hodgkin’s disease at the age of 28. In 2003, Laura’s husband began treatment for non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. And incredibly, a year later, Laura’s daughter, Susan, who was named for Laura’s sister, was herself diagnosed with Hodgkin’s disease a week before her Auburn graduation.

Thus began for the Stachler family two and a half years of chemotherapy. As Laura sat in the treatment center with her husband and daughter and watched countless other cancer patients, she felt the need to do something.

She turned to what she knew best – baking. Since she knew ginger had been used for centuries to calm upset stomachs, she created “the ultimate gingersnap” – filled with old-fashioned spices and dark molasses, topped with sparking sugar crystals.

Both the Stachler patients recovered. And for five years, Laura and Susan made their cookies and fancy cakes in a commercial kitchen they built in an extra building on their property on Spalding Drive.

They built their customer base through word of mouth and their website.

Along the way, they named their business Susansnaps and developed the three types of gingersnaps that form their core business today – original, cocoa and citrus – as well as a variety of gourmet cakes. Everything they make is handmade, natural and fresh. Even their packing “popcorn” is organic and recyclable.

As business co-owners, they divide their responsibilities according to their abilities. While Laura works on the recipes, Susan develops all the graphics. Together, they both do all the shopping, baking, order-taking and packaging.

Susansnaps, however, is more than just a fancy little bakery. Laura and Susan donate 10 percent of their profits to the Susan Carver Foundation, named for Laura’s sister. The foundation sends half to the National Cancer Institute for genetic cancer research and uses the other half to provide gift packages to patients undergoing chemotherapy during the holidays.

The opening of the shop is the fulfillment of their dream to bring the happiness of their cookies to more people. Today they ship their colorful gift packages throughout the U.S. Customers can purchase by calling the shop at (404) 497-9210, emailing through the website www.susansnaps.com or visiting at 229 Hilderbrand Drive in Sandy Springs. The shop is open Tuesday through Saturday

 

by Jennifer Bratt

Susansnaps: A Good ThingTalk about a survival story.

Laura Stachler lost her sister, Sue, to cancer in 1977. A generation later, Laura sat with her husband and daughter, as both went through 28 rounds of chemotherapy. 

Ken Stachler began his chemo in the spring of 2003. A year later Ken and Laura’s daughter Susan began treatment for Hodgkin’s disease. There were days when father and daughter would sit side by side, receiving treatment.

A tireless supporter to her family, Laura came up with a sweet way to combat the enervating nausea that chemo produces: homemade gingersnaps, rolled in sugar crystals. (Ginger is a natural way to assuage nausea.)

It didn’t take long for word to spread of this special family business, Susansnaps – www.susansnaps.com. The sweet treats have garnered all sorts of ink, including a mention in Paula Deen’s Christmas magazine.

Last month, Laura and Susan were honored at the “Martha Stewart Living’s Dreamers Into Doers” gala. A 250-word essay that Susan penned told their story and earned the two a trip to the gala over the weekend of Oct. 22-24.

Laura Stachler was awarded a $1,000 gift from Stewart and $1,000 from Bank of America to put toward the business and a $250 Talbot’s gift card.

A portion of snaps proceeds benefit the Susan Carver Foundation, a non-profit organization benefiting cancer research that is named for Laura Stachler’s late sister. Their motto: “A Snap Today, A Cure Tomorrow!”