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February 3, 2025
ANTIGO – A business born from one woman’s passion for “fine” chocolate – and her love for chickens – has something to satisfy everyone’s sweet tooth in North Central Wisconsin.
Emiley Stevens, founder and owner of Chocadoodledoo LLC in Antigo, said when she first opened the business in Washington state eight years ago, it was because she wanted to do something for herself.
“I thought it needed to be something I was passionate about – something I really enjoyed,” she said. “I really love fine chocolate, and I also love chickens.”
As the youngest of three sisters growing up on a farm in Illinois, Stevens said she was in charge of caring for her family’s chickens.
“That’s kind of where my love for chickens started,” she said.
An equal love of chocolate, Stevens said, inspired her to open a chocolate shop – but she realized she needed more than passion to get started.
“I decided that I would open up a chocolate shop, but I needed to go to school first,” she said.
Stevens said she knew a little bit about how to make the universally beloved sweet, but not enough to open a chocolate shop prior to attending Ecole Chocolat – an online chocolatier school.
“That is where I learned my trade,” she said. “Then I opened up my business in 2017. I didn’t have a brick-and-mortar location, so what we did was rented a commercial kitchen, made our (products) and then we would attend various events and fairs and things like that all around (Washington) state.”
The Chocadoodledoo name – as one may have already guessed – is a combination of both her passions.
Roughly three years later, Stevens said the COVID-19 pandemic threw a wrench into her business model as markets, events and fairs were canceled – forcing her to close the business.
“Everybody started canceling all their events and fairs and things, because of social distancing and all that,” she said. “So all of a sudden, everything that we had planned to do or could do was gone. We didn’t have enough capital to buy a brick-and-mortar store. So we just ended up closing the business down.”
Shortly after, in August 2021, Stevens said she and her husband decided to move to Wisconsin.
Chocadoodledoo round two
One month after moving back to the Midwest, Stevens said her husband contracted what ended up being an aggressive case of COVID.
“He got really, really sick – lots of complications,” she said. “He ended up in a coma with an intubated feeding tube. He was in ICU for about four and a half months, and in rehab for another few months after that.”
Stevens said at the time, she wasn’t working in order to be there and care for her husband as he underwent medical treatment, sometimes hours away from their home.
“The furthest away he was, was way down in Liberty, Illinois,” she said. “So I had to spend a lot of time traveling and stuff when I could see him, when they allowed it, because COVID was still going on.”
Stevens said her husband was released from the hospital at the beginning of February 2021 – allowing him to return home.
“Of course, he was very, very weak – on oxygen, using a walker,” she said. “So he needed to have somebody to care for him full-time, which, of course, was me… (but) I needed to have a job. At that point, the savings that we had was starting to run out.”
With their backs up against a proverbial financial wall, Stevens said she needed a job that provided the necessary flexibility for her to care for her husband.
“I thought, well, now is a better time than any if I wanted to open up my business again,” she said.
Employing a very similar business model to the one she had in Washington state, Stevens said she once again began making chocolate and other confectionery products for local events, and on Feb. 22, 2021, Choaddodledoo was reborn – this time, in Antigo, Wisconsin.
The ‘perfect’ building
Stevens said when she reopened Chocadoodledoo, she first began making products in her home kitchen – eventually graduating to a commercial kitchen, which she rented in Wausau.
“Wisconsin food laws (allowed you to make) baked goods at your house, but you (couldn’t make) chocolate,” she said. “You can now, but back then… they considered chocolate as a ‘no-no’ to (make) at home.”
After operating out of that kitchen in Wausau for several months, Stevens said she “happened to meet the owners of the building that we’re in now.”
Stevens said her building, located at 816 5th Ave., used to be home to a local wine shop – Wild Epitome.
“One of the owners, Pam, has a real heart for entrepreneurship and is well-known for helping people get started, helping them out and giving them tips,” she said. “I think we met at the farmers’ market when I was there, and she asked me if I wanted to do some pop-ups at her wine shop.”
Those pop-up shops, Stevens said, gave Chocadoodledoo “more exposure” to the local community.
Six months later, Stevens said Pam and her husband Bob decided they wanted to retire and asked Stevens if she was interested in buying the building.
“I had considered other buildings around town, so we were looking… (but) I had some specific requirements based on our long-term goals and what we wanted to do, and none of the ones we looked at were the right kind (of building),” she said. “This building was perfect.”
Stevens said she purchased the building at the end of October 2022 and opened the doors to her first brick-and-mortar location on Christmas Eve, 2022.
More than chocolate
The 12,000-square-foot building now home to Chocadoodledoo, Stevens said, has two floors and a basement – offering plenty of space for more than just chocolate.
“The basement is almost entirely the kitchen with some storage area,” she said. “Then we have our main floor, which is our sales floor, and the rental room in the back – we call it the Coop. It’s in the back of the (main) floor, and then the entire top floor is primarily open office space.”
The Coop, Stevens said, is “a very large, 1,800-square-foot venue room” equipped with tables and chairs, for community members to rent.
“We do parties there as well, and sometimes I will make things for the people at the party,” she said.
Stevens said Chocadoodledoo also has what she calls a dessert cafe.
“We’ve got three or four tables and chairs in this little area with a fireplace,” she said. “So we let people use that for free, like if somebody has a small meeting, or, (for example), we have a book club that meets there on Friday nights. They can just be there, and if they want to order stuff, they can. If not, they just sit there and do their thing and enjoy the fireplace.”
Stevens said she makes roughly 80% of the products sold in her store while also featuring products from other local, Wisconsin-based vendors.
“We also do special orders,” she said. “We’ve done a lot of special orders for birthdays and Christmas and Valentine’s Day is coming up, so I’m expecting a lot of orders for that.”
Though her speciality is chocolate, Stevens said she also makes baked goods to sell in the store.
“We have (made) simple birthday cakes and cupcakes and things like that,” she said. “We don’t go into the ‘all-out, five-tier wedding cake’ type stuff, but we do a little bit of baking.”
Stevens said she can also cater to people’s dietary restrictions and allergies when specified.
“There’s a lot of things I haven’t done, but I would have to say, if somebody wanted it, I would give it a try,” she said. “I’ve been baking and working with chocolate and stuff like that since I was little bitty. So I’ve had a little bit of experience – I’m open to trying new things.”
‘The place to shop’
Fifth Avenue in Antigo, where Chocadoodledoo is located, Stevens said, was “at one point… the place to shop” prior to the construction of a highway diversion roughly six years ago.
“There were a lot of stores downtown, people spent a lot of time downtown, and then when they put the highway diversion in, it started to die,” she said. “Slowly, it has been on the rise again. You’ve got a lot (fewer) empty buildings, you have a lot (fewer) derelict buildings – people are starting to take some pride in the buildings, fix them up and make them beautiful and usable again.”
With increasing downtown traffic and her previous exposure via the farmers’ market and her pop-up shops, Stevens said the community was excited to hear that Chocadoodledoo was establishing a permanent store location.
“When everybody learned that we bought a building and were going to have more offerings and be available pretty much five, six days a week, they were very excited about it,” she said. “So business has been good.”
Though currently in her slow season – “right after Christmas, but right before Valentine’s Day” – Stevens said overall, Chocadoodledoo has been “very well-received” by the people of Antigo.
“For me, creating something that people love and makes people smile – I love it,” she said. “It takes the world off my shoulders.”
Stevens said for those outside of the Antigo area, she is happy to mail orders, as all of her products are “shippable.”
