"He even took the gramophone on safari. Three rifles, supplies for a month, and Mozart"

This is where I work. . .

"We" are the music makers,and we are the dreamers of dreams"

A long long time ago, even before you were born, there lived a man in Italy named Dominico Ghirardelli. He had a dream of making and selling sweets. He packed up and moved to South America, changed his name to Domingo and learned all about chocolate. He then moved to California during the gold rush, not for gold but to open a store and he did in 1852. Domingo moved the main store and factory to San Francisco, CA where it remains today. Ghirardelli Chocolate is now owned by the Lindt swiss chocolate company and the location that's second to Ghirardelli Square's success is the Chocolate shop where I work.

Here's a little about what I do there. . .

In every Ghirardelli there is someone who greets and hands you a sample of chocolate. You'd think this would be the funnest and easiest job in the world but you might feel differently after 8hrs of crowds coming at you, wanting more, rarely saying "thank you," dropping wrappers on the floor, while having to say welcome and tell them about our assorted 50 and 80 count bags. I usually only do this job for maybe a 1/2hr of the night if that.

Here are my most received questions and comments:

1. "How many samples do you give out a day?" Anywhere from 6,500 to 11,000. Oh, and each of those sample squares are cut open by someone in the back.

2. "What smells so good?" They're making waffle cones

3. "I'll take your whole basket!" I hear this so much it's hard for me to even fake laugh

4. "How do you stay so skinny working in a place like this?" I practice self-control and I'm not a chocoholic but my canned response is that I'm working on it.

5. "I've been to the one in San Francisco" Yes, that's where it all started

6. "How do you pronounce the name?" Gear-ar-deli

7. "Do you have sugar-free chocolate?" Nooooooooooooooooooooooo, the closest is our Intense Dark 86%, it has 6grams for ever 4 squares

8. "Do you have the peppermint?" That's a seasonal flavor, we'll have it at the beginning of November

9. "Will the chocolate melt?" Yes

10. "Do you have Godiva ?" No, ma'am we only sell Ghirardelli. This really happened. There's also a lot of "Please don't put your hands in the basket"

In the back of the small store there is a smaller room that might fit 3-4 people to pack the chocolate from the boxes into clear bags and tie bows around them. This takes a lot of personal motivation for usually one or two people to keep up with how much people buy and filling the shelves. All the while making sure the outside looks neat and clean as much as possible. Some of the flavors we sell are milk chocolate, 60% dark, milk choc caramel, dark choc caramel, dark with mint filling, dark with raspberry filling, milk choc peanut butter, and vanilla dream. Through this job I have become an expert at tying bows.

At the end of the night I go out and clean up the final damage that has been done. We also have a lot of other packaged products like bars, hot cocoa, drinking chocolate, seasonal items, non-pareils, chocolate-covered fruit, cookbooks, brownie and lave cake sets, chocolate sauces, and so forth. What are my favorite items you might ask? Intense Darks are my fav, especially 86% Cacao which is the most intense. I don't think you can handle it. Also, the Luxe Milk which is a creamier not as sugary milk chocolate. My favoritest is the hazelnut in that collection. Both of these are made from all natural ingredients unlike our biggest seller, milk chocolate caramel.

On the other side of our store is the soda fountain where you can get all sorts of ice cream things.

Feel free to visit anytime you'd like!