<body><div><figure><img src="https://img.particlenews.com/image.php?type=thumbnail_580x000&amp;url=0vcKdc_1GycfLW400" alt="https://img.particlenews.com/image.php?url=0vcKdc_1GycfLW400" width="970" height="550" ><figcaption>Eight well-known snack joints got their starts in Bucks County. Do you know which?</figcaption></figure><p>A porch window on Bristol Pike. A converted garage in Pipersville. A roadside honor stand in Hilltown. </p><p>Bucks County snack businesses have a habit of turning modest beginnings into loyal followings.</p><p>Farmers markets, village shops, and one family dairy gave local food makers room to start small. Here is how eight of them began.</p><h2>A Firefighter’s Porch Window</h2><p>In 1984, Philadelphia firefighter Bob Tumolo began selling water ice through the porch window of 1227 Bristol Pike in Andalusia, part of <a href="https://bucksco.today/tag/bensalem/">Bensalem Township</a>. </p><p>He named the business Rita’s for his wife, who helped make the ice for that first store. </p><p>By 1996, the chain had topped 100 stores in nine states.</p><h2>Bucks County Cookies, Chips, and Caramel Corn</h2><p>Karen Riley started baking for the Doylestown Farmers Market, and in 1993 she and Craig Silbert built the business into Bucks County Biscotti, with a bakery beside their 18th-century home in Hilltown. </p><p>Bags are still sold at an honor stand at 10 West Creamery Road, an idea the company has carried to the Queensbury, N.Y., area.</p><p>Brad Gruno’s story began with a dinner. His aunt, Joyce Murphy of Ottsville, served him a five-course raw meal, and he started experimenting with homemade chips. </p><p>Around 2009, he began selling them at a Bucks County farmers market, then moved production to a converted garage on a Pipersville farm.</p><p>A mention on the <i>Today</i> show in November 2011 set off a flood of orders. “I was sitting there at my computer screen and the whole screen just filled up with orders,” Gruno said in a December 2011 WHYY report. </p><p>By 2014, Brad’s Raw Foods had about 120 employees and products in roughly 100 <a href="https://bucksco.today/tag/whole-foods/">Whole Foods</a> stores, and the <i>Inquirer</i> reported annual sales closing in on $20 million.</p><p>Linda and Jules Sghiatti built Clusters Handcrafted Popcorn around the caramel corn they loved on the <a href="https://bucksco.today/tag/jersey-shore/">Jersey Shore</a> boardwalk. </p><p>The shop opened at 7 W. Bridge St. in <a href="https://bucksco.today/tag/new-hope/">New Hope</a> and later moved to South Main Street.</p><h2>Sweets and Pretzels</h2><p>Skip’s Candy Corner at <a href="https://bucksco.today/tag/peddlers-village/">Peddler’s Village</a> in Lahaska was started by Constanti Pietrak, known to everyone as Skip. </p><p>Shop No. 27 sells handmade chocolates and fudge, and it was nominated for a <a href="https://bucksco.today/tag/usa-today/">USA Today</a> 10Best Readers’ Choice award in 2026.</p><p>Vince Marinelli opened a soft pretzel shop on State Street in <a href="https://bucksco.today/tag/doylestown/">Doylestown</a> in 2000. </p><p>He and his wife, Danielle, opened Sweet Pea Ice Cream in <a href="https://bucksco.today/tag/newtown/">Newtown</a> in 2008, then a second Sweet Pea next door to the Doylestown pretzel shop, cutting a pass-through between the two. </p><p>In 2020, Sweet Pea opened The Salt Box in Plumsteadville, serving ice cream and stuffed pretzels.</p><p>Marinelli later renamed his Doylestown and Souderton pretzel shops <a href="https://bucksco.today/tag/philly-pretzel-factory/">Philly Pretzel Factories</a>, according to a 2013 <i>Inquirer</i> report. </p><p>That chain’s first store opened in Philadelphia’s Mayfair neighborhood. “On May 2, 1998 we opened up and at nine in the morning. </p><p>When we were going to close, there was a line out the door,” co-founder Dan DiZio told 6abc in 2024. </p><p>Today the chain has about 170 locations and a headquarters in Bensalem.</p><h2>A Dairy Bar’s Second Act</h2><p>The Goodnoe family’s Newtown dairy dates to around 1920, when John and Mabel Goodnoe began delivering milk, eggs, butter, and cream. </p><p>In 1955, Raymond Goodnoe moved the old Toll House and opened the Goodnoe Farm Dairy Bar around it, serving more than 38 flavors of its own ice cream.</p><p>The restaurant closed on Labor Day 2006, after 51 years. In 2009, Colin Goodnoe and his sister, Kendall, brought the ice cream back at a new location on South Sycamore Street. </p><p>“It’s difficult to believe it’s been a whole year since we opened the new store,” he said in a July 2010 Bucks County Taste article.</p><p>A Newtown Heritage Walk marker near North Sycamore Street and Silo Drive still tells the story of the farm and dairy bar.</p><p>___</p><div style="position:relative;width:100%; height:0; padding-bottom: 56.25%;"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/CqrGVcqk7RY?feature=oembed&amp;enablejsapi=1" allowfullscreen frameborder="0" style="width:100%; height:100%;top:0; left:0; position:absolute"></iframe></div></div></body>

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A porch window on Bristol Pike. A converted garage in Pipersville. A roadside honor stand in Hilltown. Bucks County snack businesses have a habit of turning modest beginnings into loyal followings. Farmers markets, village shops, and one family dairy gave local food makers room to start small. Here is how...

Bucks County Snack Businesses That Started Small

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A porch window on Bristol Pike. A converted garage in Pipersville. A roadside honor stand in Hilltown. Bucks County snack businesses have a habit of turnin

Bucks County Snack Businesses That Started Small

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