In 2002, Hershey closed the Wheat Ridge, Colorado, plant and moved the manufacturing of the candy to Mexico to save costs.
History
Bill Harmsen founded the Jolly Rancher Company in 1949, choosing the name to give the impression of a friendly Western company. He initially sold candy, chocolate and ice cream in the Denver, Colorado, area, but found that ice cream was hard to sell in the cold winter months, and so he decided to focus on hard candies which sold at all times of year.
Flavors
Jolly Rancher original flavors were watermelon, apple, and Fire Stix. They then introduced cherry, orange tangerine, lemon, grape, peach, and sour apple. Eventually, blue raspberry replaced lemon. Current flavors include cherry, blue raspberry, grape, green apple and watermelon. There are also sour, cinnamon, and smoothie varieties. In 2013, lemon was reintroduced in an all-lemon bag. In 2015, Jolly Rancher offered a "Fruity Bash" variety bag which includes strawberry, mountain berry, lemon, orange, and pineapple. In 2017, Jolly Rancher offered a "Hotties" variety bag which includes watermelon & cayenne pepper, blue raspberry & sriracha, cherry & habanero, and green apple & ginger. In 2020, Jolly Rancher offered a tropical variety bag featuring fruit punch, golden pineapple, lime, and mango flavors. They also offer a "red" bag, which included cherry, watermelon, strawberry and fruit punch. As of 2012, the passion mix, which included the peach flavor, and the wild berry mix were discontinued by The Hershey Company. The Hotties mix has been discontinued as of 2019.
Chemistry
Jolly Ranchers are amorphous solids, meaning their molecular arrangements have no specific pattern. They are hard, brittle, rigid, translucent and have low molecular mobility. Jolly Ranchers are formed from highly concentrated sugar solutions and have extremely high viscosity. Their “glassy” appearance is a result of the way they are processed. During processing, the sugar syrup is cooled so rapidly that no crystals have time to form. Jolly Ranchers hold their solid shape when kept in temperatures less than the glass transition temperature. If the temperature is greater than the Tg, the hard and glassy-like structure of the Jolly Rancher becomes a soft and rubbery material.
Manufacturing
Jolly Ranchers are manufactured by creating a solution of corn syrup, sucrose, glucose, or fructose syrup that is boiled to a temperature of 160 °C/320F and cooled to create a supersaturated mixture that is roughly 2.5 percent water. As the mixture is cooled, natural and artificial flavoring and artificial colors are added to individual batches of syrup solution which are later mixed with malic acid to improve shelf life and add further flavor. Once the mixture begins to cool it is then extruded into long malleable strings that are cut to size and individually wrapped and packaged.
