CORNWALL, Ontario – Cornwall’s Downtown is a little happier after today, and business is popping! The Happy Popcorn Co. opened its doors for the first time ever, located on First Street, just across the street from the Cornwall Square mall.
“It’s a soft opening, we’re going to have a major grand opening in the new year,” said Bill Halman, co-owner alongside his partner Kristin Davey. “We wanted to get our doors open for people to have a chance to see what we’re doing here, to see what it looks like and what flavours we’re starting off with. We’ve got so many ideas for new flavours just from today alone, from people telling us what they’d like.”
For Halman and Davey, the Happy Popcorn Co. will have a special role in their lives going forward. When they embarked on this venture it wasn’t just to start a family business, but a business that suits their family.
“We decided to do this for a number of reasons, the biggest one is that our son Jack is on the autism spectrum,” said Halman. “Within the next few years he is going to need a job, and we know how hard it is for young people, or anybody on the spectrum, to get a job. We know he’ll be able to do this very easily.”
Halman and Davey also plan to provide opportunities for other prospective employees who are on the autism spectrum or living with learning differences.
“We’re going to be hiring in the new year and we’re going to be hiring people with intellectual disabilities.”
Just like almost every other business, popcorn came with a learning curve.
“We learned a lot about how it’s made…there are six different types of actual corn used for popcorn,” explained Halman. “A butterfly popcorn is good for your movie theatre, whereas your mushroom popcorn is great for caramel corn and stuff like that.”
The Happy Popcorn Co. will be open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. from Tuesday to Saturday. Their hours can also be found by connecting with them on Facebook.
