The National Confectioners Association observes June as National Candy Month to recognize employees of the candy industry at all levels. There are more than 55,000 people working for candy companies as well as the 400,000 people in agriculture, retail, and transportation working with the business indirectly. Retail generates $35 billion in candy sales annually.

Organic candies contain cane sugar instead of GMO sugar or high fructose corn syrup. They also use natural ingredients for color and flavors, natural waxes, and more heat stable oils as opposed to the red dye No. 3, bromated vegetable oil, potassium bromate, and propyl paraben found in conventional candy.

Being certified organic also means it has other non-GMO ingredients which weren’t sprayed with any pesticides such as glyphosate. Additionally, the organic candy companies source their ingredients from farms where the workers are treated fairly and paid a fair price for their work.

While chocolate amounts to 60% of retail sales in candy annual, it doesn’t sell its best during the summer as it melts easily. Instead, sweet tooths turn to other types of confections, such as gummies, chewy candies, hard candies, lollipops, caramels, and salt water taffy. So I’ve decided to focus my article on non-chocolate candies as the month falls in June.

In alphabetical order, here are the 8 best organic summer candies:

Black Forest

Black Forest lives up to its name with its commitment to sustainability and real ingredients. Its gummy bear candies are all made with fruit juice. The colors for the gummies come from plant based sources. Additionally, Black Forest works with the National Forest Foundation in planting trees to guarantee the forest will be around and thriving in the years to come. Last year, 50,000 trees were planted across 7 national forests.

Hammond’s

Founder Carl T. Hammond Sr. opened Hammond’s Candy Factory  over 100 years ago as a small family business committed to quality. The first candy he created was Carl’s Honey Ko Kos, which were chocolates topped with shredded coconut. What began as a one man business soon developed into Carl hiring a manager to run the store while he traveled throughout the west selling candy to other retailers. Several generations of the Hammond family ran the company from Carl’s son Carl T. Hammond Jr. to Carl Jr.’s son-in-law Emery Dorsey. In 1995, Williams-Sonoma purchased a number of their products and Hammond’s became a national name. The company was sold in 1999 to three veterans of the candy industry who expand Hammond’s from a small business to 10 employees to a factory twice as large with over 60 employees. In 2007, candy lover Andrew Schuman purchased Hammond’s. Having a similar background in retail and enthusiasm for entrepreneurship as Carl T. Hammond Sr., Andrew eventually expanded the company to 300 employees and into the snack foods arena. Hammond’s organic choices are in the forms of lollipops, hard mints, and candy canes.

Lovely Candy Co.

The Lovely Candy Co. started when Jackie Nakamura asked her husband Mike to bring her home a candy free of artificial ingredients, GMOs, and gluten. Soon after, Lovely was born. They now have a large and diverse line of candies. Their organic options include chewy candies, lollipops, and hard candies.

Rosemallow Artisanal

Lani Fox combines her lifelong passions for gardening and cooking with Rosemallow Artisanal. Lani also had been preserving jam for 25 years. During the pandemic and the supply chain shortages, she began making marshmallows for her children. Everybody in the neighborhood loved them from kids to adults. As it had been a while since she prepared any jam, so she took the unused strawberries and honey to make a strawberry honey marshmallow. Lani then walked out to her garden, looked at the basil, and felt it would add nicely to the strawberry and honey. Tasting this concoction, she knew this was her path. Next Lani came up with 20 unique marshmallow flavors. Many of them were made with fruits and vegetables from her own garden. She refers to using her own heirloom produce as beyond scratch. Lani went from selling the Rosemallows along her kids’ lemonade stand to once a month in the Claremont, CA community to launching an online store. Lani has regular Rosemallow flavors plus many seasonal offerings.

Surf Sweets

The story of Surf Sweets begins in Santa Cruz, CA when two surfers were looking for allergen friends treats. Surf Sweets today remains true to its origins with candies being both tasty and consisting of allergy-friendly, organic ingredients. They also keep with their founders’ vision as they donate a minimum of 1% of gross sales to causes related with keeping a clean, ocean, preserving open space, and providing access to healthy, delicious food. Surf Sweet has an extensive variety of gummy animals, including bears, fish, and worms.

Sweet Apricity

Tonya Butts founded Sweet Apricity as an answer to the question “Can I ever eat something fun again?” Tonya first made dairy free caramel as a graduation gift to her best friend who has autoimmune disease. Her friend was undergoing the autoimmune protocol (AIP) which provides strong relief for those with autoimmune disease and eliminates gluten, grains, chocolate, dairy, eggs, and refined sugar. As that meant her friend couldn’t consume any story bought sweets or snacks, Tonya saw promise in a business which caters this group. All of Sweet Apricity’s products are grain and dairy free. They also contain a natural sweetener of either coconut sugar, honey, or maple syrup in place of any refined sugar. Sweet Apricity’s line has grown since inception now ranges in everything from sea salted caramels to caramel puffs to caramel sauce to grass fed marshmallows of different flavors.

Torie & Howard

Torie & Howard is named after its founders Torie Burke and Howard Slatkin. The two were interior designers who checked out all types of cuisine and restaurant and visited farmers markets while they traveled around the world for their work. Along their journey, they both had to change their ways of eating. As Howard ate healthier to lose 100 pounds and Torie changed her diet due to food allergies, it became a lot harder to find snack food which would satisfy them. So they felt this was the time to start their own snack food company focusing on candy. Their year round candies are the Chewie Fruities and hard candy products.

Yum Earth

Two young men had been living organic lifestyles. After both becoming fathers, they felt it was time to start an organic candy business. Yum Earth began with lollipops and then expanded to hard candy, gummy bears, gummy worms, jelly beans, and licorice.