The Original Candy Gram: How Western Union Turned Candy Into Communication

Though it's certainly an entrenched modern holiday, the origins of Valentine's Day can be traced all the way back to Roman fertility festivals and its status as a romantic holiday in the West dates back to Geoffrey Chaucer in the late 14th century. However, the tradition of giving sweets to your sweetheart didn't emerge until the 1840s. 

For a long time, sugar was a luxury, and the flippant distribution of confectionery was unattainable for the masses. Luckily, by the Victorian era, manufacturing and global trade were creating a sweeter market. After being kept a secret for 100 years, chocolate was abundant. In the midst of this innovation, chocolatier Richard Cadbury began to sell chocolates in beautifully decorated boxes and accidentally created the first Valentine's Day chocolates. Around the same time that the sweet treat was solidifying itself in the zeitgeist, the telegraph industry was emerging. The electric telegraph, a beneficiary of a century of scientific advancement, came into being in the 1830s and launched a new era of communication. But it wouldn't be until 1959 that these two parallel histories would finally intersect.

Western Union began its life in 1851 as the New York and Mississippi Valley Printing Telegraph Company and rebranded in 1856 as the Western Union Telegraph Company (arguably catchier). For many years, the telegraph industry boomed, and Western Union was king. Ultimately, the telephone would eclipse the company's central service, but Western Union ensured its future by expanding into money orders, financial transactions, and finally, the candy gram. The "world's sweetest message" started around Valentine's Day 1959, allowing customers to send chocolate across the country.

The original candy gram featured a one-pound box of "kitchen-fresh," "home-style" chocolates, a new take on Richard Cadbury's elaborately adorned chocolate cases. Instead of Victorian embellishment, the gift box's cover was your telegram. One of the first Valentine's Day messages was a company gift sent to New York's Western Union offices, with pleasant greetings and an encouragement to amplify the new service. Still, early ads for the candy gram suggested slightly less dry, corporate messaging from customers. The candy gram, they said, was a way to make your words mean more and to extend congratulations, holiday wishes, and romance in a new way. The campaign quickly surpassed Valentine's Day, and candy grams were marketed for Mother's Day, Easter, birthdays, and anniversaries.

The "greeting that's for eating" was just $2.95 for a pound and $5 for two pounds of luxury chocolates from one of America's great (although unspecified) candymakers. Some of the Western Union offices had freezers where the chocolates were kept, so when you called to order a candy gram, the request would be wired to a confectionary-stocked location (and hopefully defrosted, since you shouldn't serve frozen chocolate truffles). The marketing campaign for candy grams was also used to push another Western Union service: the credit card, which the company had unveiled in 1914. So if you were sending a candy gram, you could make the transaction even sweeter by just charging it.