BEAR CREEK — Southern Supreme Fruitcake & More, like many retailers, was prepared for a slower holiday season because of the ongoing impacts from the coronavirus pandemic.
But this season’s success may be a little too sweet.
“We started thinking we might not have a record breaking season as what we’d had the year before, so we kind of started gearing towards that,” co-owner Randy Scott said. “And as the season went on, it kept getting a little bigger and a little bigger and a little bigger, and now we’re out of most everything.”
For Southern Supreme, the supply chain for ingredients has been the weak link this season, making it hard to match the demand of customers.
According to a message posted Monday on the store’s Facebook page, this has led to delays in processing orders.
“We are so sorry we are experiencing so many delays this year,” the message read. “We have had delays in receiving ingredients, boxes and containers and with the United States Postal Service. We assure you we are working diligently to process all your orders even though we have limited products. We are still taking orders but they will not ship until after Christmas because of the delays in ingredients and boxes.”
“That’s putting a big damper on what we can actually produce,” Scott said. “Our fruitcake has six or seven different ingredients. Well, if I can’t get all six or seven of them here, at the same time, I can’t make fruitcakes.”
Because of a high volume of orders, Southern Supreme decided to shut down its website and limit the amount of orders taken over the phone. Orders placed after Dec. 11 will not be shipped until after Christmas.
“We don’t want to take an order from somebody that we know we can’t fill,” said Scott. “We feel obligated to just tell them up front. Most people, 99% of them, have been very understanding that this is a very different and difficult year. So we’re trying to please as many of the customers as we can.”
Despite these obstacles, Scott said the season has been quite the achievement.
“We’ve done more than we ever thought we would do,” he said. “It’s not going to be the biggest season for us as it was last year, but it’s not going to be very far off.”
And although it’s taking longer than usual, the store will continue to process as many orders as they can.
“We’re cooking today,” he said. “We’ll be cooking tomorrow. And we’ll be cooking every day next week. All the way up to Christmas. We’ll cook as long as we got something to put out there.”
Southern Supreme Fruitcake & More started in 1984 and operated out of founder Berta Lou Scott’s daughter’s garage. It has since grown into a family-owned business. It is located at 699 Hoyt Scott Rd, Bear Creek. To visit their website, go to www.southernsupreme.com.