KC Confectionary

KC Confectionery – “85 years of sweet success”

First published in Newsday.

For 85 years they have been satisfying our cravings for sweets and KC Confectionary intends to continue for years to come.  KC Confectionary Limited began in 1922 as a cottage industry and has diversified and expanded today to a fast paced, people-driven company that is foremost in technology and innovation.

Ashmeer Mohammed, Director of KC

Ashmeer Mohammed (pictured), director of KC told Sunday Newsday that the company has been successful for so long because of their innovative ideas.  “From time to time we install and upgrade equipment, we recently introduced state-of-the-art hard candy equipment that produces ten tonnes of candy automatically in eight hours,” he said.

KC is famous for their dinner mints, chocolate-centred mints and lollipops. In 1990 the company expanded and added Ball Bubble Gum processing to its range.  Mohammed revealed that they are the only company in the Caribbean that produces all three types of candy – hard candy, bubble gum and toffees and chews.

The company has been in the export business for over 45 years with 65 percent of their products being exported.  “We have been exporting to countries prior to the country joining Caricom, we have been exporting to Suriname for 18 years and Haiti for 12 years. We not only export to Caricom countries but to the United States, Canada and England,” he said.

He shared that the reason for their success in the foreign markets is the way they approach their flavours and colours.  “When you taste a Caribbean fruit and you taste the similar fruit in a temperate country it is not going to taste the same. As people become more widely travelled, they want unusual and different products,” he said.  One of the things that they spend a lot of time and effort with is their flavours.  “We do blending a lot. Flavours are sourced from all around the world, we do not use flavours from any one place,” he said.

A team of persons in the Research and Development Department headed by the CEO are the ones responsible for coming up with new ideas for their products.  “They meet once a month, they look at different concepts, they also visit a fair amount of exhibitions and fairs around the world,” he said.  Mohammed explained they try to launch at least two products every year with their most recent being their sugar-free range.

“Candy has a wide following from a little child to adult, and we found that a lot of people in the Caribbean and Trinidad suffer from diabetes. Sugar-free is not only for diabetics though, it is also for people who want to control their sugar intake,” he said.   One of the top selling products is their ginger mint because of its natural benefits.  “People use it for different things like upset stomach, nausea and other health related things, and it really has been doing well,” he said.

Mohammed admitted they were also the first company to put love words on their products.   “If you know anything about candy, nobody had ever done that and that innovative concept has been copied by a lot of companies,” he said.

Mohammed said another important aspect of the company is that they protect their intellectual property.   “KC is registered in China, Canada, US, a lot of our products are registered there,” he said.

KC is also a company very concerned about the environment as they have changed the way their ingredients are shipped.   “Liquid glucose and sugar are the two main ingredients in producing candy and we usually get our glucose in big plastic drums but we now bring them in Flexi bags rather having 60 to 68 drums that have to be disposed of after,” he said.  “Two things are being achieved here, we are not using much plastic drums and we are cutting the costs of raw materials with that kind of technology,” he added.

IT was 1920. Trinidad and Tobago was still under Crown Colony rule, but talk and hope of the first partial elections filled the air across the streets of Port-of-Spain. Separate from the growing political excitement, in a quiet village of Central Trinidad a simple man by the name of Elahie Baksh stumbled across something secret and amazing.

Of East Indian descent, Baksh was a tall, chocolate-skinned man with the widest smile and a hearty laugh. His broad shoulders could carry the largest bundle of straw, and he was known for his soft and caring nature, being the father of four daughters and one son.

Baksh loved children and worried especially about the future of his five precious ones. He wanted to give them a better life than the poverty he had faced as a young boy. Baksh’s parents had undertaken the long and difficult journey by sea all the way from India in order to secure a better life for themselves and their children in Trinidad. Coming to Trinidad however, had not been as easy as expected. Baksh did not have all the material possessions or the financial security his parents had dreamed of.

Then one day, in the quiet of his home, he had a brilliant idea and while praying, he asked God to bless his vision and effort for what was to happen for the new generation to come.

Baksh believed he had discovered a special and exotic recipe for making candies. It was something he hoped he would be able to teach his daughters and son so that they too would share and spread the joy of candy to all children. With the help of his wife and his children Mr. Baksh undertook the cooking, wrapping and selling of these candies and baked sweets from his home. The goodies quickly became a favourite in the little village.

Some time passed and Baksh’s eldest daughter Zainab was married to an enthusiastic and helpful young man by the name of Abdur Razack Khan, which naturally filled the heart of the now aging Baksh with much joy and happiness. Together, the new couple mastered the management and running of the business and were able to teach their children the secret art in candy making from a very young age, even after their beloved grandfather had left the world.

It was the 1930’s. Jainup and Abdur Razack had eight children and the family had been supporting themselves by means of the little candy business. They were contented and the business was thriving. Suddenly, Abdur Razack Khan — the son in law of the late Baksh, was struck with a lethal fever, leaving his wife and eight children behind.

One of his sons, Ibrahim Khan was just ten years old at the time. Despite his tender age, Ibrahim took it upon himself to oversee and manage the business of his parents. He was a compassionate and caring young lad who purchased the ingredients himself, helped his mother in manufacturing the candies and undertook the delivering of the goods by bicycle to different customers in the town.

Sugar cost six pence at the time and the candy produced was then sold for 12 pence by the family. The profit was used for the needs of the family and to re-invest into more ingredients.

It was a time of struggle and hardship but the family remained patient and gained courage from their sense of family spirit, keeping faith as their weapon.

Under the vision and management of Ibrahim, the business grew and expanded its reputation across the town and the neighbouring villages. Their candy business became known by all as “KC” short for ‘Khan’s Confectionery.’It was Ibrahim who then decided to keep this name thinking he would call it “Khan’s Crystal Confectionery,” to better represent the quality and appearance of his candies — nothing short of gems and jewels! In 1946, Ibrahim Khan administered the moving of the business to its present-day location in Couva and formally launched the name KC Confectionery Company but did not officially indicate what the abbreviation stood for.

It was at this new location that Ibrahim met and married the beautiful Korisha Hassan-Ali who was also skilled in the art of confectionery and bakery. The two worked harder than ever to establish and build the name of KC so that by 1957 the business had gained the reputation of a candy factory, recognised throughout TT.

Ibrahim and his wife were blessed with ten children — five boys and five girls. Together, the family mastered the running of a company with each member contributing a different skill to the organisation. The co-operation, persistence and vision of the family called for the constant upgrading and improvement so that by the 1960’s, the Khan Family had implemented semi-automation of all their candy manufacturing throughout the factory.

By 1976, KC had evolved into a fully automated processing plant, utilising the labour of almost 100 persons and registered as a Limited Liability Company later that year. Ibrahim was then fifty years old at the time. The birth of his first grandchild inspired a deep reflection on the future and a profound compassion for the well-being of all of humanity especially towards his new generation.

He did not want his grandchildren to experience any of the life of hardship and suffering that he had faced. He wanted them to have the opportunity of education and the chance to dream and become anything their hearts desired. He wanted them to grow up in a world of love and harmony, living with peace and happiness. It was this sentiment that inspired his first scribbles on paper that later became the famous love messages on KC dinner mints, to encourage and spread love in the hearts of all people.

Before Ibrahim’s passing in 1989, KC Confectionery Ltd. had expanded its present location and building by two and a half (2.5) acres and was recognised as a key player in the candy industry throughout the Caribbean. Ibrahim was my late grandfather and he taught me that through perseverance, vision and faith, a person can accomplish all that his heart can dream, even despite the odds. Granddad recalled that back in the 50’s it would take them an hour to wrap 700 candies. I wish he was here today to see that KC can wrap 12,000 candies per minute or 720,000 candies per hour!

It is with great awe that I can stop to reflect on the life, the hopes, the dreams and the accomplishments of my great-grandparents Jainup and Abdur Razack and of my great-great grandfather Elahie Baksh. Almost 100 years ago, Baksh prayed in the quiet of his simple home, asking God to bless his vision in starting a candy business.

He wanted to make children happy. Today, KC brings smiles and happiness to millions around the world.