Giveaway started 8/1/2011 – ended 8/18/2011 at Midnight

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CCBerries : Authentic Gourmet Ingredients, Taste the Amazing Difference

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We have a winner in our chocolate covered strawberry giveaway:
Edgardo F,  of  Colorado.  (Currently deployed in Afghanistan)
Congratulations Edgardo (stay safe) 

3 ways to enter

1) Enter Online (Below)
2) One automatic entry per shipped order at ccberries.com
3) Tell friends about this giveaway. (details below)

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Terms and Conditions

Eligible:
US residents, 18 years of age or older. Employees of CCB Radiance/CCBerries, their families (and the members of their immediate families,and/or households), SAS affiliates, or suppliers are ineligible to participate or win. Subject to all applicable federal, state, and local laws and regulations. Void where prohibited.

Entry:
Three methods:
1) Online using the form on this page, one entry per person, email address or IP address.
2) Automatic entry for each order shipped between August/01/2011 and August/18/2011
3) Tell your friends and family about this giveaway, if they enter your email address or twitter user name in the “How did you hear about our giveaway?” field you’ll be entered again. (If you tell people to enter your twitter ID you’ll have to follow @ccberries on Twitter so we can notify you). One referral per entry. How you tell your friends about us is up to you: Twitter, Facebook, Renting a blimp, use your imagination, but don’t spam or break the law..

Notification:

Winner will be randomly selected and will be notified by email and/or phone on or before August/31/2011. The winner will forfeit any prize or prize certificate not claimed within forty-five (45) days of winning.

Prize:

Prize consists of a single use discount code for a $50 discount off of product(s) with chocolate covered strawberries ordered online, discount code is valid for a single order and can not be split between orders, not valid with any other discount codes or on phone or fax orders. Discount does not apply to shipping costs or or other handling fees.

There is no substitution, transfer, or cash equivalent for prizes, the prizes are expressly limited to the item listed above and does not include taxes, or any other expenses. Other restrictions may apply.

Privacy:
None of the data collected will be sold, rented, given or otherwise transferred to a third party.
The phone number entered above will only be used in the event of verification of a winning entry. Email addresses will be added to our customer newsletter system which you can later opt out of. Feedback data may be used in our testimonial section (without your last name) but has no effect on giveaway.

Odds of winning are dependent on the number of entries received.

Entries found to be submitted fraudulently will be removed. This includes but is not limited to: computer generated entries, entries with false/non-working phone numbers or email addresses, entries from outside the United States, entries by people under 18 or with invalid city, state or zip codes.

Entry deadline: as described above by Midnight August/18/2011 Eastern.

We often get asked how to save on shipments throughout the year.

The first way is to place more than one order at a time, as our final checkout screen (the ‘thank you’ screen) has a discount code that even new customers can use to place more than one order at a time.

The second way is less obvious; simply combine your order with others as part of the same shipment this saves you a pile on shipping. To save even more look at our multi dozen chocolate covered strawberry assortments.  There is no special box that holds two dozen strawberries, when someone orders two dozen strawberries (or more) they are delivered in one dozen boxes. It’s pretty simple, order a 4 dozen chocolate covered strawberry assortment and you will get 4 boxes of one dozen strawberries. If you split those four dozen with 4 people at work your strawberries and delivery charges will be a whole lot less than if you each ordered separately.

Our wholesale flowers also are a great way to save money, our 100 ,200 and 400 long stem red rose packages can be split up upon receipt and you have roses for a whole lot of people. That’s a whole lot more than the $90 we’ve seen some local florists charge for a dozen roses on Valentine’s Day.  If you do the math right you could even get the other people to pay for your roses and they would still come out way ahead.

Order early: we place your order with the flower suppliers as soon as they come in, for Valentines we normally see stepped price increases as we get closer to the big day. The sooner you order the lower prices you’ll pay. It’s not that the suppliers are pricing gouging, there are millions of people asking for the exact same thing on the exact same day, this creates shortages of product, transportation, and trained labor. Special flights have to be arranged to bring the flowers into the US (it’s not like a whole lot of flowers are coming from Michigan in the dead of winter. They have to be flown in from South America).  The flower suppliers don’t want to suppress their January sales so they raise the prices in steps, the people that get the orders in soonest get the January prices, if you wait till the week before Valentine’s you’ll pay much more.

The same price increases happen in the strawberry market, plus if there is a freeze in California or Florida the prices for a flat of strawberries can easily jump $20 overnight. Strawberries are even more sensitive and perishable than roses and there are only so many places that they can be grown this time of year. Getting your strawberry order in early avoids the risk of price changes due to weather related problems or being locked out due to product shortages.

But if all you were after was a discount code … use “I-M-EARLY” it’s good on orders over $36 that are placed before 01/30/2011 (you’ll select a delivery date during checkout and can place  orders as far in the future as June). The discount code is only valid online and must be applied just after you press “Add to Cart” it can not be combined or used on previous orders or if  you have canceled an order in the last 30 days.

Here is an example of a right and wrong address.

Wrong:

Grandma Mary
134 Peachtree
Coral Gables, TX 60609
305-999-9999

Right:

Mary Smith
Shady Rest Home
1234 SE Peachtree Rd
Room 512
Coral Gables, FL 33146
305-555-1212

How each wrong entry affects the delivery.

1) Since Grandma Mary lives in a retirement community there are probably more than one “Mary” there.

2) Missing company/school/retirement home names effect the shipments in two differnt ways

a. The drivers may know the business or school so if you transpose a number in the address it could still get to the right location.

b. When you leave off the business name you put the package on the residential delivery schedule, which may mean the driver will attempt to deliver the package after the business closed

3) The street number is very important, a wrong number can put a package miles from the correct destination and the unintended recipient will really enjoy your gift.

a. We have had actual shipments where the address we were given was about 3 miles offshore in Miami. (we caught it so the address got changed before it left the building)

b. We’ve had a shipment where the son sent the package to “12 Thunder Way”, but the mother lived at “21 Thunder Way”, the people at “12 Thunder Way” ate the shipment.

4) The street name needs to have the correct street, avenue, road, lane, or court designation. In a lot of cities there are multiple roads with the same name with only the St., Ave. Rd… to separate them. It lets the drivers know which of many roads with the same name to deliver the package to.

a. In Atlanta there are several roads named Roswell, and dozens named Peachtree, this same problem happens all over the country.

5) Missing Apartment, Suite, room numbers

a. A missing apartment number can ruin a shipment if there is no directory or apartment manager to accept the package, and many apartment managers no longer accept packages for residents.

b. We’ve had customers send packages to 100 story buildings without a company name and no suite number, it didn’t go well.

6) The City, State and Zip code need to match, Coral Gables is not in Texas and “60609” is for Chicago.

a. Most of the time UPS and FedEx will not let a package ship when the zip code is not in the correct state, but if the zip code is in the wrong section of a state it may take several days to correct the problem.

b. We’ve had customers put in their (up-state New York) zip code when the package was going to New York City, the packages are sent to the sorting facilities based on the zip code given, so once a misaddressed package is found the planes are gone and delivery is pushed to the next day.

7) When all else fails UPS & FedEx will call the phone number you give us for the delivery address, a fake phone number guarantees that the driver will not be able to fix any address problems while on his route. It should be the actual phone number of the person or business the package is being shipped to.

Addressing a letter or package correctly is something we all learned in grade school, and while a misaddress Christmas card will eventually get there a perishable package (like chocolate covered strawberries) can be ruined as the result of the delay. The delivery address is always your responsibility and taking the extra time to double check it is always a best practice. (plus then you are not telling others that it was our fault that the package was not delivered)

How did it start:
In 1921 a group of confectionary companies in Cleveland Ohio gave out over 20,000 boxes to the elderly, poor, orphans and newsboys (the kids that used to sell newspapers on street corners). They also arranged for the delivery of confections to some of the biggest start of the day. In 1940 another 10,000 boxes were given to charities, and various religious group leaders.

Unlike Valentine’s Day, it’s not just about your special someone; it’s not affiliated with any religious beliefs or dependant on family or personal relationship.

But… if your girlfriend comes from an area that comes from an area that celebrates it (or picked it up somewhere along the way) you might want to ask her about it.. just to be safe…

Sooo. What do we do for Sweetest Day, unlike the bog box stores that change what they sell dependant on the season, we sell Chocolate Covered Strawberries all year round. Just like we make chocolate covered strawberries for Birthdays, Romance and Halloween (and just about every other holiday and event) we also make our custom creations for Sweetest Day.

Hints for saving on Sweetest day:
Giving to two or more local people or two or more people at the same address? Combining shipments, (even with friends) saves about $10 per box on the chocolate covered strawberries just on the shipping alone, when combine that with our pre-discounted assortments of 2, 4 or 8 dozen strawberries the savings can be huge. Just make sure to get your orders in early (delivery dates are selected during checkout).

Even if you are sending gifts to more than one address: a discount coupon code is shown on the final page of checkout that is good for orders that you place on the same day.

Other ways to save: join our e-mail newsletter, Facebook group or follow us on Twitter

So what is real chocolate?,
We’ll use white chocolate as an example. Below is the pertinent section of the regulation on White Chocolate (from http://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/cdrh/cfdocs/cfcfr/CFRSearch.cfm?CFRPart=163)

“White chocolate contains not less than 20 percent by weight of cacao fat”

Cocoa fat is what the FDA calls cocoa butter.

Below is an example of a sample of partof an incorrect ingredients label from a competitor.

Look at it closely, there is no cocoa butter in the definition of any of the chocolate types.

As you can see there is no cocoa butter in any of the so called “chocolate”, yet the company that makes and sells the product continues to advertise “chocolate covered strawberries”.  All the mislabeled ”chocolate”  above is partially hydrogenated oil based, there is zero cocoa butter.

Our Chocolate Covered Strawberries are made with real gourmet chocolate and all have cocoa butter just like you would expect from a gourmet gift.

Caramel Apples
Large Granny Smith apples hand dipped in thick rich caramel, them dipped in our gourmet chocolate. You even get to select the chocolate types and decoration/toppings.

Chocolate Covered Caramel

Caramel Apples, Chocolate Strawberries and Flowers

New Floral/Strawberry Assortments, for more details see the product by clicking on the pictures. 

Mother's Day Floral and Chocolate Covered Strawberries

Easter Flowers and Chocolate Strawberries

We’ll be adding more new assortments with chocolate covered caramel apples and floral assorments as the year progresses.

To understand what is happening you have to look at how they are shipping it and what they are shipping.

For the first example lets look at a purchase of a book. A book it not time sensitive, it can take a week or two to get to where it needs to be and it’s still a book. Places like the larger book stores have warehouses around the country and the book is shipping using the least expensive way possible. In this case the shipping may actually be less that a dollar, no big deal.

Next lets look at a clothing purchase, some jeans, a few t-shirts… again it is not time sensitive, it’s shipped by the least expensive method possible and the shipping was probably less that you would have gotten last year with a discount coupon.

So basically shipping things by slow/ground methods are pretty inexpensive but it’s not for time sensitive items. Perishable items need to be shipped so they arrive before they melt or go bad and that pretty much rules out the really cheap shipping. You could guess what a shipment of ice-cream would look like if it took a week to arrive.

All the ‘free shipping’ offers have created the impression that all shipping should be free, but when you are comparing ground (slow) and express(overnight) the shipping is not in the same class. When you ship a package using an overnight service it is sent by air and jet fuel is not cheap.

In an age when the airlines are charging $50 to check luggage, the undiscounted rate for sending a package cross country is about the same. If you ship a lot of packages (like we do) you get a discount from the base rates, but past a certain point there are no more discounts from the carriers.

Everybody has heard the phrase “there is no such thing as a free lunch”, and in the case of overnight shipping and perishable products it’s true. In the perishables industry the various companies are “simulating” free shipping in one of three ways:

1) Raise the prices, yep when the cost of the product price has been raised to cover the cost of the shipping the shipping is then ‘free’. You actually don’t save any money this way, it may even cost you more because now that the product cost includes the shipping you may end up paying tax on the price including shipping.

2) Cut the cost of the product, packaging and the shipping cost by using a 2 day service rather than an overnight one. Cheaper ingredients and shipping so that it arrives later gives the product a extremely short shelf life and no ‘cushion’  in case of carrier or weather delays.

3) Changing the product mix or limited item free shipping, the ads say ‘free shipping’ but it’s on limited items, those items may only be shipping by the less expensive methods or already have the cost of the shipping built in.

When shipping chocolate covered strawberries you need to protect the product from heat and keep them chilled to keep them fresh. Some companies are leaving out the gel pack and shipping the strawberries using a 2 day service. Leaving out the gel pack reduces the shipping cost in two ways, the weight is less and the box does not have to be as big. Without a gel pack to keep the box chilled the strawberries are going to start to go bad very quickly. Would you want to eat strawberries that have been sitting on the kitchen table for two days? Of course not, but that is what 2 day shipping without gel packs is.

So you  can see that ‘free shipping’ really’ is not free someone always pays the UPS/FedEx bill.

And it’s not just a blogs, I was reading a candy making book in the “for dummies” line and it was the worst of all.

The culprits? Washing and drying the strawberries. One candy shop owner actually said not to wash them. A blog entry said to just wipe them down.

 Both are really bad advice for the same reason: strawberries are grown outside… outside with the birds, wild animals and bugs. Strawberries are not grown in an hermetically sealed environments. They are gown in fields, in dirt, with chemicals (natural or man-made) to control the bugs, with birds dropping things on them from above.

I’ve washed and inspected pallets of strawberries, and I’ve seen what gets washed off of them. The amount of just dirt in unbelievable, but everything that is grown outside is visited by things that live outside and sometimes those things (the little ones) hitch a ride on the strawberries.

Does organic make a difference? Only as far as some of the pesticides go, birds, bugs and dirt are still the same.

Strawberries must be washed thoroughly and then dried completely. Washing them under cold running water for several minutes will do the job. (don’t spray too hard.. you don’t want to pulverize them, and hot water will cook them). Make sure you flip the berries to get complete coverage and rinse out under the leaves.

Drying the berries is important since any water in your chocolate will cause it to seize (get clumpy). When I’m doing a lot of berries at home I line a cookie sheet with a clean towel, or lots of paper towels, and put the freshly washed berries on the sheet. Then I put another layer of towels on top of the berries, lightly pushing down the towels between the berries. I then take the whole tray, towels and all, and put it the fridge for at least a half hour.

Just before I start dipping (while the chocolate is being tempered) I remove and hand dry each berry, with a paper towel,  putting them on a separate tray. Swap your paper towel with a  dry one as needed. Make sure there is no moisture hiding under/in the leaves as it can ruin your day.

If you look at the older posts you’ll see how to temper chocolate at home.. with this info and a little practice you’ll be dipping line a pro.

Click Here to be taken to our website and our October newsletter

Upcoming stories:

* Grandma’s Brownies,
* What never to do in the kitchen
* Christmas savings ideas

15% off of Halloween decorated Gift Boxes and Party Packs
Exclusive Savings
Add coupon code NL-GOBLIN to your cart at the first step of checkout for 15% off of any Halloween decorated gift box or party pack.
Make your Halloween party spectacular or
just send a gift to a friend,
either way our hand dipped chocolate covered strawberries are sure to be a hit.

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Save $15 on our Sweetest Day Chocolate Covered Strawberry and Floral Combo.
Exclusive Savings

 Add Discount code NL-SWEETEST to your cart at the first step of checkout to activate your discount.

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Dont Forget About Boss’s Day:

 Don’t forget about Boss’s Day, maybe they will even share.

Birthday Strawberries

Thanksgiving Strawberries

You can see all of our products at www.ccberries.com

Enjoy your day & thank you for your interest.

CCBerries.com,
CCB Radiance LLC

CCB Radiance LLC , 2711 Centerville Rd MB 6578, Wilmington DE 19808