Sweet Success! For Sassafras Sweet Shoppe

Someone's always there in the beginning. When an Apple computer was created, a Gap store was opened, the first-ever Ford rolled off the assembly line, when Reese's added your peanut butter to my chocolate, there were people there to watch and cheer.

There are very few true overnight success stories in our world. It's largely a figure of speech. Hard work, sweat equity and time are required along with the best of ideas. Yet, some take on a sense of inevitability, take off so quickly the phrase works � the magic it conjures.

Sassafras Sweet Shoppe is no longer just a great idea locals enjoy and automatically include on the itinerary for out-of-town guests. I don't think it would be overstating it to say it's not just a local success story anymore � it's beginning to look more and more like a national one.

I talked to Rebecca McCamy, Sassafras' owner and creator, for a blog last year within six months of its opening. She was excited by its reception, happy, as she noted then, to bring a real attraction for kids � of all ages � to Park Avenue. She did it with her own childhood in mind, a desire for her children and their friends to have something similar.

On a recent Saturday I visited again to talk to Rebecca, who was as usual hustling from one activity to another, smiling and interacting along the way. I got there early as store manager Ashlee Workman prepared for a birthday party. She talks of Rebecca being a woman who couldn't be mean if she tried, who enjoys practical jokes. I ask what kind and she tells me of a dead lizard on a purse, signs in the front window for a good-looking guy at the bakery across the street. "What has she not done? She hacks into my Facebook, or used to at least," she says. The results were usually a changed relationship status, posts such as "Dear Baby Jesus, thank you, I have the best boss ever." I laugh but realize another reason why all that's around me works so well � It was a great idea conceived for kids by a big kid, as anxious for the fun as anyone else.

There is no store I visit on Park Avenue in which I can so easily predict the reception inside: big smiles, forthcoming laughter, giggles. Yeah, it could be just working around so much candy, or the store's wonderfully playful decor, but it's more like Willy Wonka � the fun, playful Gene Wilder version, not the creepy Johnny Depp one � resides here, created the whole thing, understands people and their need to have some fun.

Rebecca enters the back room to greet the birthday girl, her mother and several attendees. She sees the birthday girl's new colorful princess-type outfit and immediately exclaims: "Oh, I want one. Can I wear it next?" We hustle the group out into the front of the store and Rebecca and Ashlee pose for pictures with her, the birthday girl smiling from ear to ear. I think how this is an experience this little girl will remember for a very long time, possibly her entire life.

I talk to Rebecca after winding our way up the store's now iconic spiral staircase to her office. It's different up here from last time. She tells me that with all their recent growth they've been forced to organize. She assures me � herself, I think � that it is a good thing.

Learn more: Sassafras Sweet Shoppe, at 115 E. Morse Blvd., is open 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Thursday, 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. Friday and Saturday, and 10:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. Sunday. Call 407-388-0101 or visit sassafrassweetshoppe.com The growth and activity have not been minor. In addition to lots of local press, she's now under way with franchising work and new stores as soon as this fall. She will be included in the August issue of Southern Living as a local tour guide of sorts. She was included on a recent reality dating show on MTV and yes, as most know, was the vivacious and fun "mompreneur" featured on Anderson Cooper's new daytime talk show a little more than a month ago. I comment on how natural she was on the show, to which she responds, "I was freaking out inside. Seriously, if you saw the pictures of me beforehand, I was a nervous wreck." She says she gets questions from people via e-mail and on Facebook inquiring how she's gotten so much amazing press. We discuss again what's behind the store's appeal: the fun, that anyone can buy something here, a desire for it all during such scary financial times. The Anderson Cooper piece, she tells me, was the result of her sister forwarding an advertisement she'd seen for the show looking for a mother with a business and children, battling to get organized. She "sat" on it a few days, then called and told a recorder about herself. They called her back in five minutes and conducted an interview. A producer had indicated they had up to 1,000 calls from interested moms across the country.

A film crew was flown into town the following week for footage of her running about, picking up kids, dropping off kids, working at the store. They told her not to clean or organize, as she tells me of how "horrific" her home office was. "They said don't touch anything," she says, a bit exasperated. "I mean, I really lost my son's homework that day, and I was like please do not put this on national TV." She talks of running around all day with a mic on, forgetting it was there, producers asking Ashlee, "Is she always like this? Crazy and silly. She told them she's on her best behavior for you guys today." Her tone gets a bit more serious when she talks of becoming a flagship store, having prospective franchisees visit the store, the need for checklists and manuals and all that will require.

I ask where she wants to be a year from now and she responds, "Hopefully, running the franchise company with three to five new stores. I don't want to grow too fast, but I want to expand. I think there are so many places across the country that would love to have a store like this. And that would just make me happy, to see other towns with a cute little store which makes everyone happy. That's where I want to be." Happy to say I was there to see it all early on.

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