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One Hot Cookie expands to Pa.
By Kalea Hall
YOUNGSTOWN
One Hot Cookie will soon have two locations in Pennsylvania.
The speciality dessert shop known for its unique cookie offerings will soon have a location in Pittsburgh’s Ross Park Mall and the Grove City Outlets in Grove City, Pa.
“It’s the next natural progression of where we would go,” said Bergen Giordani, co-owner of the cookie shop.
Bergen opened the business in 2013 in downtown Youngstown with her daughter, Morgen.
The pair saw success in their entrepreneurial endeavor and eventually opened locations in Niles and Boardman.
The Grove City One Hot Cookie location will open sometime in late August, and the Ross Park Mall location should open by next week in the upper level of the two-story mall.
“It’s a manageable challenge,” Bergen said.
The Boardman store at 1315 Boardman-Canfield Road will stay the base for the local business where the frostings for the cookies and the dog treats are made.
“We are a twist on a traditional sweet shop,” Bergen said. “One Hot Cookie is a nontraditional bakery.”
One Hot Cookie has 20 different types of cookies. There’s salted caramel pretzel, a sugar cookie topped with caramel-covered pretzels, mini chocolate chips and cookies drizzled with chocolate sauce. Another favorite is the peanut butter cup, a double chocolate- chip cookie with crumbled peanut butter cups topped with chocolate sauce.
The shop also offers brownies, ice cream and popcorn. Cookies and brownies are served hot, hence the name: One Hot Cookie.
“We have tremendous support from the Mahoning Valley,” Bergen said. “Everyone loves cookies, and we are trying to grow the brand. We have learned along the way that we need to be in a heavily trafficked area.”
While running One Hot Cookie, Bergen is the development director for The Rich Center for Autism at Youngstown State University, and Morgen is a student at YSU studying medical laboratory research.
“I have tremendous support from the Rich Center,” Bergen said.