Did you know…Lovesick shoppers shell out more than $19 billion in Cupid’s name each year?

Valentine’s Day is the third-largest consumer holiday in the U.S… We love to spend money on our friends and family for Valentine’s Day, no matter if they’re a significant other, our beloved pets or even ourselves. Our staff at Swoon Katy shares some fun and interesting Valentine’s Day Facts

The Mother of the American Valentine

Esther Allen Howland was the first manufacturer of Valentine’s cards. She was inspired by the cards in England and she decided to sell similar designs. According to Time Magazine, during the 1850s she earned $100,000 annually, which is about $3 million today.

How Chocolate & Valentine’s Day Mated for Life

Some of the most famous names in candy were instrumental in the connection of Valentine’s Day and chocolate. In 1861, Richard Cadbury, a marketing genius, began putting Cupids and rosebuds on heart-shaped boxes. He knew after the candy was gone, people would use the boxes to save mementos and love letters.

However, the commercialization of Valentine’s Day flourished at the turn of the century. In 1907, chocolate pioneer Milton Hershey created the tear-dropped shaped “kisses,” named for the smooching noise made during the manufacturing. But when it comes to commercial chocolate, no one has outdone Russell Stover. The company began when Clara Stover started wrapping “Bungalow Candies” in her Denver kitchen in 1923. She and her husband moved to Kansas City and opened several factories, selling their Valentine’s chocolates in heart-shaped boxes to department stores across the Midwest.

Valentine’s Day Facts You Probably Didn’t Know…

According to History.com, the oldest record of a valentine was a poem Charles Duke of Orléans wrote to his wife when he was imprisoned in the Tower of London in 1415…

However, it wasn’t until 1537, that England’s King Henry VII officially declared Feb. 14th the holiday of St. Valentine’s Day.

Candy hearts were originally medical lozenges….

In 1847, Boston pharmacist Oliver Chase invented a machine that simplified the lozenge production process, creating the first candy-making machine. Chase quickly shifted his focus to candy production with Necco wafers. 15 years later, his brother, Oliver Chase, developed a way to press words onto the candy with a felt roller pad and food coloring. The conversation candies officially became heart-shaped in 1902, and today about 1,000,000 of them are sold each year.

Most popular flavor in chocolate boxes?

According to the National Confectioner’s Association, chocolate covered caramels are the most popular flavor in chocolate boxes, followed by chocolate-covered nuts, chocolate-filled, cream-filled, and last but not least… coconut.

Flowers of Love

The red rose was the favorite flower of Venus, the Roman Goddess of love and beauty. They are also the flowers of love because red stands for strong romantic feelings.

220,000…  is the average number of wedding proposals on Valentine’s Day

Valentine’s Day Cards

From kids in classrooms, pets and even old married couples, according to The Greeting Card Association, 145 million cards

are purchased for Valentine’s Day each year. This makes Valentine’s Day the second biggest holiday for greeting cards after Christmas. But did you know that over 50 percent of all Valentine’s Day cards sold are purchased in the six days prior to the holiday, making Valentine’s Day a procrastinator’s delight.

A Love Affair With Spending

According to the National Retail Federation, Americans spent $18.2 billion for Valentine’s Day in 2017 and $19.6 billion in 2018.

Learn more Valentines Day interesting facts by reading the full article in our January/February issue of Swoon Katy starting on page 9… click here for the digital version.