sweetriot blog - cacao | culture | cool!

Thanksgiving & cacao

The rioters were out today celebrating Thanksgiving!  To give thanks, cacao was spread through out the city.  Imagine being given free cacao on the streets of NYC...all sorts of holiday revelers exclaimed, "Wow."  "Thank you!"  "No Way." 

You'll see pictures here of our stops at Columbus Circle, Washington Square Park, and Union Square.  We especially celebrated on Columbus Circle where sweetriot can now be found at the beautiful Whole Foods.  Luckily, it was a sunny day and the holiday spirit was in the air.  (Rioters pictured were Megan, Jake, Joe, Nina, Heidi and Sarah.)

Matt, our 2nd full-time rioter!

Matt joined full-time last week - woo-hoo!  He has been working part-time for a few months and it was great to have him join officially.  Our growing start up needs great people and we feel lucky to have found Matt.  Here are some photos from Riot-tation (Orientation) and our street meeting with Malcolm Gladwell, the author of Blink and The Tipping Point.  We also made a few cool stops in the city along the way.

Gay Life Expo

    Wow!  sweetriot had an amazing time at the GayLife Expo this past weekend.  First of all, we were honored to be the only cacao & chocolate present at the expo. 

As we are committed as a company to celebrating culture and diversity, it was a great place for us to share cacao, and there were so many new cacao lovers created...many had never experienced the beauty of cacao direct as they grew up just eating bars and truffles.  We have some great shots from the show of all of the rioting.  It was simply out of control!  We were interviewed for the Q Network, and Robin Byrd is a new fan too. 

sweetriot was also invited to spread Cacao joy at the Commerical Closet event in Soho tonight.  You can see the sweetriot by candlelight above...it was distributed through out the beautiful Commerical Closet gallery event on Green and Grand Streets in Soho, the original art district of NYC.  Many lovers were created...

Art & Film in NYC this week

sweetriot was out and about in NYC this week.  There is so much culture and art to celebrate in NYC.  We spent some time demo'ing at the MoMA Store and also celebrated the new book of Paola Antonelli from the museum curation staff.  We also stopped by the GenArt Film Event. 

Here are a few pictures of the rioters...and our yummy cacao Demo at the MoMA Design Store in Soho and on 53rd Street.  As a small start up, we are proud to be the very first food product ever at the MoMA Design Store!  We will be rioting there again in December, so come visit. Dates will be posted at http://www.sweetriot.com/about/live/   

We are also working on selecting our next artist to feature on our tins.  If you know any artists, please have them visit our featured artist page for more information on how to become the next artist on sweetriot's tins.

Warren, Sugar Rush, and riotin'

One of our favorite visitors to the Chocolate Show this past weekend was Warren Brown, owner of the bakery, Cake Love, in Washington DC and star of the new Food Network show, "Sugar Rush." 

Being a 'lover' himself, Warren got the riot right away and just sat back and visited with us for awhile.  He loved the energy and the sweetriot cacao nibs too.  He is such a rioter and has a great philosophy for his business! 

The Chocolate Show!

sweetriot had an amazing 4 days at the NYC Chocolate Show.  We sampled loads and loads of cacao to many anxious rioters. 

There were new rioters and old rioters and young rioters and newlywed rioters and rioters from

New Zealand, Japan, France, and the list goes on…

There was chocolate everywhere but there was only one company dedicated to cacao and sharing the beauty of the cacao bean.  Did I mention that company was sweetriot?  :)  Epicurious mentioned us too.  The excitement and energy was amazing.  Here are some of our favorite riot pictures....

Giada DeLaurentiis from the Food Network

We were excited tonight to find another sweetriot cacao lover - Giada DeLaurentiis.   (Nina absolutely loves her show on the Food Network.)  We bumped into her at the Chocolate Show Fashion Show and found out she is already busy eating sweetriot cacao.  She loves how she can take a little bit at a time and still get an amazing amount of flavor. 

Giada was in NYC filming Behind the Bash, which is a great Food Network show covering behind the scenes activities at cool events around the country.   Watch out for the footage of her speaking with sweetriot and others at the Chocolate Show 2005.

GenArt

As I sit surrounded by cacao in my tiny NYC apartment, I feel so lucky every day to work with such a great team on such a great product.  Tonight was a busy night. 

First of all, we were the featured 'tasty treat' at the GenArt event in the Puck Building in NYC.  GenArt is a great organization, which showcases emerging artists.  They are a great partner of sweetriot's.  At the event, we met great rioters including someone who caught one of our little 'peace' bags during the Village Halloween Parade - considering there were 2 million spectators and we threw less than 1,000 tiny bags, it was amazing.

I mentioned it was busy.  During the GenArt event, Nina and I popped over to the Chocolate Show Fashion Show to check out the happenings...wow....more on that in a moment...

To close my thoughts on GenArt, I just want to say you should check it out - cool people doing great things to showcase emerging film makers, designers, artists, and more!  Here are a few pictures with the great team from GenArt including Jeff, Tali, and Adam.

American Apparel & the sweetriot t-shirt

Due to popular demand, sweetriot's first t-shirt is coming!  Please let us know if you are interested.  It will state - "i riot for cacao."  sweetriot is using American Apparel as our t-shirt partner as we feel they have a unique culture and company.  As this t-shirt launch looms, Nina and I met the Founder of American Apparel, the ever interesting, Dov Charney.  Dov recently said that as the company grows, he has tried to maintain an 'environment of freedom.'   We respect that.  We also respect that he believes in socially progressive business and takes a stand for what he believes in.  Go, Dov, Go!

Friday's at the Guggenheim

There is this cool activity that started this past Spring -  'First Fridays at the Guggenheim.'  On Friday nights from 9 pm - 1 am, the museum brings in DJ's and everyone can mingle, dance, and view the art at the same time!   It's such a great concept and of course sweetriot was on hand passing out the joys of cacao.

If you haven't been to the Guggenheim, it is an amazing structure with beautiful art.  Their fall exhibition is RUSSIA! — a major exhibition of over 275 masterpieces, many never before seen in the United States.  At the upcoming First Friday events, the Guggenheim presents world renowned DJ's:  Funkstörung, December 2 and Diplo, January 6.