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Context and history, to the greatest extent Bacter can possibly summarize it
Alright.
Stay with me for this one, because it's a trip.
The first thing you should know is that most of this information I got from two sources: the candyman kitchens website, and the free hour-and-a-half long documentary that is featured on almost every page.
Weird Al Yankovic is in the documentary? And he is palpably bored and irritated to be there? I had tabbed away and thought "I recognize that voice" and sure enough there he was. I'm sorry, I'm off track, I'm just so excited by all this.
Alright.
So, David Klein. Small-time candy peddler, and man with big dreams. What kind of dreams?
Well, one time he had a dream to hand out free ice cream from an ice cream truck, so he, without calling ANYONE, filled a van full of ice cream, and drove to an ice cream truck dispatch office, and asked if he could pass it out.
I think... in his mind, the fact that he brought HIS OWN ICECREAM would be the real deal-sealer. Who could say no?
Obviously, the answer is that the ice cream dispatch place said "what?" no". He then got in a shouting match with them because he 'had a truck full of melting ice cream', which is so far from being the dispatcher's problem that I can't even really articulate it.
Anyway.
He dreamed of... candy... fame? I guess? Candy Fame. And so, driving all around LA back in the 70s, inspiration struck. He would make a jelly bean, but SMALLER, and TASTIER.
This tiny tweak to a centuries-old candy format was roundly rejected by the candy industry. "You can't charge more for candy! That's just not done!" said an adult man in this documentary.
But he did. He persuaded a candy factory to make a sample batch, named them things like 'strawberry' and 'blueberry', negotiated space in an ice cream parlor, and sat down to make his fortune.
It didn't take.
Nobody was buying it, and his one interaction seemed to be a kid who ate a strawberry one and said it tasted like cotton candy instead of strawberry, so he changed the name.
Weeks in, and desperate, he decided to call some local papers to do a story about his wildly successful candy that was booming. He got friends and strangers to buy the candy while the paper man was interviewing him, and to pretend to call in orders.
A huge grift! Just straight-up lying to get publicity. "I'm... am I proud of that? I do not know" he literally said in the documentary. Of course you aren't!
But it worked, because that's just life in these United States. Sales took off, and he was sitting on top of a hugely valuable patent.
He then sold the hugely valuable patent for ~3m. A lot of money! But less than 1/10 of what he would have made holding on to it.
See, David Klein was a man of VISION. He liked success, but he was already searching for his next killer app. His next big hit.
And what did he come up with?
Well, in the documentary, they did a jump cut from somebody talking about how innovative he was to him 'checking up on the orders' for "alien pee", which is a sealed urine cup full of lemonade.
(pictured: this is the alien pee. This is a picture of the candy)
Let's see:
"Sandy Candy edible Sand"
"Bible Candy - Bible Candy™ is The Teach and Eat Candy™"
"Uncle Urnies Candy Ashes"
"Unicorn Poop™, Zombie Pee™, Pig Boogers™, Dragon Boogers™, Uncle Urnies Candy Ashes™, Zombie heart™, Formula Pee™, Tower of Sour™"
Kind of....
Kind of went off the rails there somewhere, eh?
So where are we now?
After three decades of... this... has the 3m run dry?
Is this a desperate attempt to raise cash so he can invent some kind of candy menstrual pad? IS THE FACTORY ALMOST CERTAINLY CONDEMNED AND GOING TO COLLAPSE?
Look, don't worry about that. Look at this noticeably disheveled man. He wouldn't lead us astray!
Yes he's glued jelly babies to a sombrero. Yes he held it up and said it was 'proof' that he invented the candy. Why do you ask?
