Dame Fran Bigelow
Think chocolate, think Fran’s Chocolates like millions of fans do, including former President Barack Obama and Food Network star Ina Garten! Created by charter member of #LesDamesSeattle and legendary chocolatier, Fran Bigelow, Fran’s Chocolates has grown from a small, European-style, boutique chocolate shop in the Madison Valley section of Seattle, to a major player in the USA high-end chocolate and specialty food business with three locations in Japan and major production facility, headquarters and chocolate boutique in the Georgetown section of Seattle.
A former accountant, this savvy business woman has turned her love of premium chocolate and high-quality ingredients into a formidable business that the current pandemic has not stopped and seemly cannot stop. Mail and phone orders, online orders and pick-ups at local Seattle Fran’s locations make her luscious, high-quality products available locally, with the company’s website, https://frans.com/, providing the locations of stores nationwide where Fran’s products are available.
From the start, quality ingredients and packaging were front and center. This did not go unnoticed by the late Chuck Williams, founder of Williams-Sonoma, when he sampled a Fran’s Gold Bar and placed the item in a Williams-Sonoma catalog. And as the saying goes, the rest is history!
Fran is a long time supporter of local non-profits including: the Windermere Foundation, Neighborhood House and Safe Crossing, the later having honored her with its Bridge to Healing Award.
Warm, gracious, fun-loving, and generous are just a few of the words that best describe Fran. And these qualities even spill over in her cookbook, Pure Chocolate, published in 2004. It’s the home cook’s answer to all things chocolate, a tome of chocolate perfection!
In 2003 the National Association for the Specialty Food Trade honored Fran’s legendary gray-salted caramels as the Confection of the Year, and in 2018, Fran was inducted into the Specialty Food Association’s Hall of Fame, a special honor for a special person dedicated to quality and to chocolate.
