61° and Clear
JORDAN, Minn. — Minnesota's Largest Candy store is moving, but not too far away.
The candy store was facing a serious dilemma with upcoming road construction in its area.
Robert Wagner says a new interchange on Highway 169 is set to close off the main entrance to his candy store.
“We needed to come up with a solution,” Wagner explains.
His family has met with county and state officials several times over the last few months to find a compromise that would work for everyone.
Scott County officials first came up with an idea to build a new road that would bring traffic into the candy store’s parking lot.
“The road wasn’t going to work,” Scott County Transportation Services Director Lisa Freese said.
“It was a pretty expensive road for us.”
Freese says building a new road would be expensive and it would only service one business, the candy store.
Freese says the road would have gone through several acres of wetland.
So, the county came up with another idea.
“We approached them with the idea of how about we trade the land,” Freese explains.
Scott County owns a piece of land less than a mile from the candy store.
Freese says the county offered to give the Wagner family that land in exchange for the land where their candy store currently sits.
“It’s kind of a win-win for all of us,” Freese says.
"It’s just a great opportunity for us,” Wagner says.
The new plot of land will place the candy story within the city of Jordan, which would give the candy store city utilities such as city water.
“Being on city utilities will be a game changer for us,” Wagner explains.
Having city sewer service alone will save his company around $40,000 a year, Wagner says.
The new plot of land also offers Wagner more room to grow his candy store.
He says the new store will be about two times bigger.
The plan is to open the new store in the spring of 2027.
In the meantime, Wagner says their current store will officially open for the season on May 1st and they will follow their normal seasonal hours through the year 2026.
“That winter we will move to our new location and have a grand opening in 2027,” Wagner says.
SOURCE: KARE 11
