Mindy loves Chris, and they're both fond of 'All Things Hershey'
Mindy Catalana wearing our Hershey Football Training Camp Tee.
One of my biggest frustrations with customers wearing masks (as much as I believe it’s the right thing to do, for customer and vendor alike) is that it’s generally harder to gauge people: their demeanor, their willingness to engage, their interest in Stay.
The eyes might be the window to the soul, but I prefer having a whole face with which to work.
Yet Mindy Catalana was immediately easy to read, even though she was wearing a mask when she approached the Stay tent in late August at downtown Hershey’s Market on Chocolate. Her passion for Hershey revealed itself quickly as she lay claim to one of our Hershey Football Training Camp Tees.
She explained her family’s fever for the Philadelphia Eagles football team: her father has had season tickets for 51 years. She was familiar with the story behind our tee. It pays tribute to the Eagles and four other clubs with National Football League ties that, from the 1940s through the 1960s, held their training camps at Hersheypark Stadium.
It was only after she posted a photo of her Stay purchase on Instagram and tagged us that Mindy was the person behind the Instagram page, All Things Hershey, which I had been following. Looking through her other posts, I knew I wanted to know more about her and her love of Hershey.
Mindy agreed to answer my questions via email.
Spelled out in Hershey’s Kisses
Now 27, Mindy has been coming to Hershey from South Jersey since she was 3. Her father’s family business, Cumberland Dairy, was involved with making Hershey’s Chocolate Milk, but her father also was drawn to rollercoasters and her mother to chocolate and shopping.
“It has truly become our favorite place to be as a family,” Mindy said.
That family includes her husband, Chris Rotz. Chris and Mindy, a speech-language pathologist, became engaged at the Hotel Hershey in October 2018, Chris surprising her with a tabletop “Will you marry me?” spelled out in Hershey’s Kisses.
“I had no idea what was happening, I actually thought it was a candy stop for the kids trick-or-treating around Hershey property!” she said. Chris produced matching Eagles jerseys, one name plate bearing the words “We are,” the other “Engaged.”
Their families joined them for dinner at the hotel’s Trevi 5 restaurant. The next morning, with the Eagles playing in London at 9 a.m. Hershey time, the families continued to celebrate with a breakfast and watch party at the hotel’s Harvest restaurant.
Chris and Mindy married May 30 in Philadelphia, the city where they met when they were students at La Salle University. For his part, Chris had visited Hershey at Christmas when he was younger, and then he joined Mindy’s family trips to The Chocolate Town when they started dating.
“Hershey just reminds me of being happy,” Mindy said, adding, “I feel like I’ve grown up there.”
Not only is Hershey a vacation spot, it’s “a home and a small town to many, also. No matter how big or how known Hershey becomes, it has never lost its charm,” she said.
Mindy also has visited Hershey at Valentine’s Day and at Easter, and in all four seasons. She’s pretty sure she has experienced every tourist attraction Hershey has to offer.
‘A hidden gem’
I have grown to love my adopted hometown, especially since starting Stay in 2017 and more recently moving into downtown Hershey, but I had to ask Mindy: Do you have friends/family members who think you're a little too into Hershey?
“Oh, my goodness, SO many people ask me, ‘Well, what do you do while you’re there?’ or ‘Isn’t that for kids?’ or my favorite one, ‘You’re going to Hershey again? Didn’t you just go?!’ I just smile,” she said.
Mindy said some people only associate Hershey with the park.
“As someone who loves the park, I think getting to know all the Hershey properties have to offer, as well as exploring the town and local restaurants, have been just as fun! Hershey, Pennsylvania is truly a hidden gem.”
It’s funny, because I’ve been saying the same about Market on Chocolate after spending three summers there as a vendor. I’ll tell anyone who asks (or will at least listen) that we need to make the market bigger and better because it is one of the prettiest locations (and can you beat the address of Chocolate and Cocoa avenues?) of any pop-up show we have done. And it provides a great opportunity for small businesses such as Stay to connect with customers.
I’m grateful to Mindy and Chris for having sought out Market on Chocolate and Stay. I look forward to seeing them again, as I suspect they’ll be back in Hershey soon.
It’ll be especially nice after this pandemic stuff, when we no longer need masks and and really can chat face to face.