On Tuesday night, following the opening of the All Candy Expo, confectioner Ferrara Pan hosted a cocktail reception, buffet dinner, and fireworks show for more than 1,000 buyers and business associates at Fulton's on the River. For the sixth consecutive year, company president Sal Ferrara tapped Andrea Hall, owner of Your Event Network, to produce the happening—which, Hall said, "was about total fun. We just wanted to make customers happy."
To create that good-time vibe, Hall's first order of business was to book the Gentlemen of Leisure. "In my opinion, entertainment is everything," she said. "People just love to rock. So it's always best to book that early so that you get the act you really, really want to have." (In fact, Hall has already started scouting out bands for next year's event.) On Tuesday, the 16-piece band stood on the top deck of a riverboat docked outside Fulton's on the River, and guests brought candy-flavored martinis out to the restaurant's waterside patio to listen to upbeat tunes such as Beyonce's "Single Ladies."
At the end of the evening, a barge pulled into the river and set off a 30-minute fireworks display—a spectacle that came with its fair share of logistical red tape. "[Putting on a fireworks show] is not an easy thing to do," Hall said. "You have to get a permit from the alderman, you have to get a permit from the city, you have to get the coast guard, fire department, and police department involved."
Along with getting permission from the right organizations, Hall had to arrange for special vertical fireworks that would work in the tight area in which the show took place. Although the spectacle managed to stop some traffic on Tuesday night, beeping horns seemed to be the o side effect. (Perhaps it was Midwestern politesse that allowed for the relatively peaceful traffic jam: "They could never pull this off in New York," one guest said on the street on Tuesday night. "People wouldn't have it.")
Because the evening was hosted by a confectionery company, and held after the expo, Hall steered clear of bringing actual candy into the event. "All of our customers and vendors have been at the show all day, and we want them to come [to the after-party] and forget about work," she said. But she did want to "subliminally" link the event to Ferrara Pan's latest product, Tropical Chewy Lemonheads. Working with designers from Daniel's Discriminating Floriculture, Hall decked Fulton's lower level in fabrics that reflected island hues of orange, yellow, and green; she also brought in palm trees, a costumed mermaid who reclined on the sushi station, and a Lemonhead-shaped ice sculpture. And at the event's entrance, a character dressed as a Lemonhead sported a tropical shirt and greeted guests.
