B.Happy Peanut Butter: Zionsville family takes it to a whole new level. The family fills up to 80,000 jars a year and ships their product to all 50 states.
B.Happy Peanut Butter
How do you like your peanut butter? In fudge? In cookies? Or perhaps in a sandwich with jelly? With a spoon? If you chose the latter, Jon and Kathy Weed of Zionsville have something for you to try, prepared in ways you may not have imagined.
“Because our three children love peanut butter so much, we tried making our own,” said Jon, a DePauw economics graduate and now a financial advisor with Morgan Stanley. “We sampled lots of peanut butters in stores, then I researched some recipes. Once we found one we all liked, we started getting the kids involved to help them learn how a small business operates.”
How to enjoy B.Happy Peanut Butter
- With apples or bananas
- Mixed into smoothies or with yogurt
- Over vanilla ice cream
- With a spoon
- On crackers, pancakes or warm bread
Today the Weed children — Jackson, 20; Julia, 18; and Sawyer, 14 — are all part of the B.Happy Peanut Butter team, a name derived from a list of family guidelines. “One of the guidelines, ‘Be happy,’ sounded too much like a command for a brand name so we shortened it, then we added a dancing peanut and spoon for the logo,” said Jon.
In its first four years, the B.Happy product line has grown to nine flavors with ingredients ranging from white chocolate chips (“Dream Big,” “Joy to the World”) and coconut (“Don’t Worry”) to dried fruit (“Pay it Forward,” “Count your Blessings”) and toffee (“Go Lucky”).
The Weed family started selling their peanut butter at the Zionsville Farmers Market and eventually broadened their distribution network to include local Target and Fresh Thyme stores, online sales and gift boxes for holiday giving. “Our big time for sales is the fourth quarter around the holidays,” said Kathy.
B.Happy Peanut Butter flavors
- KeeP Smunchy: Plain peanut butter
- Dream Big: Their best seller — White chocolate and pretzel bits
- Go Lucky: The Weed kids’ favorite — Milk chocolate, toffee bits and crispy rice
- Joy to the World: Cranberries, white and dark chocolate bits
- Happy Trails: Trail mix with chocolate chips, raisins, peanuts
- Pay it Forward: Dried apples with cinnamon
- So Happy Together: Snickerdoodle popcorn
- Don’t Worry: Dark chocolate, coconut and almond
- Count Your Blessings: Milk chocolate and dried cherries
Like any successful business, Jon and Kathy have strategies for the future: a bigger commercial kitchen and production facility, rebranding their products and redesigning their product labels with brighter colors and adding nutrition information.
Today the family fills up to 80,000 jars a year and ships their product to all 50 states. “We’ve got a lemonade stand on steroids,” said Jon. “We’re not only doing something we all love, but our kids are also gaining some valuable business sense.”
Where to find B.Happy Peanut Butter
- Indy-area Target stores
- Indy-area Fresh Thyme markets
- Joe’s Butcher Shop, Carmel
- Zionsville Farmers Market
- Goose the Market, Indianapolis
- Twisted Sisters, Indianapolis
- Homespun, Indianapolis
- Nicole-Taylor’s, Broad Ripple
- Online at bhappypeanutbutter.com
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