Hadley Rosen, a 15-year resident of West Hartford, has teamed up with her dad and launched the chocolate business Chocolena, which is renting kitchen space at GastroPark and has had regular pop-ups there as well. Rosen said she and her husband Todd (a wealth manager at May, Bonee, and Clark), have two children at Braeburn School, and in 2020 she left her role as director of communications for the software company, Finalsite, to join her father Jim Weiss, in his business, Pomfret Chocolates. After retiring her dad launched the business in Pomfret (that’s where she is from) and was offering fine chocolates at pop-ups, farmers’ markets, and wineries. “I became a certified chocolatier from Ecole Chocolat in Vancouver where my father had trained. We rebranded the company as Chocolena, reimagined it as focusing on hand-painted bonbons, chocolate bark, and chocolate bars, and created a website, www.chocolenasweets.com.”
Rosen said she is very thankful for the assistance of the Connecticut Small Business Development Center (CTSBDC) – particularly their “amazing advisor” Michelle Augustyn – for their help in launching the business, “and have had a great experience working with the town of West Hartford Economic Development.