The centres of Sweden's three largest cities all boast upmarket stores selling artisanal liquorice and Belgian-style chocolates but that is absolutely not what you want. Real Swedish candy comes from factories and is anything but artisanal.
Producers include the Swedish confectionery giant Cloetta, smaller players like Grahns, Bubs, and Grenna, and international companies like Finland's Fazer and the US multinational Mondelez.
What you're looking for is either a branch of Hemmakväll, the giant in the Swedish candy business, or a specialist retailer that aims to have an extensive selection of lösgodis ‒ literally "loose sweets", Sweden's word for "pick and mix".
With over 70 franchise stores in just about every Swedish city, Hemmakväll sells more Swedish candy than anyone else. The name means "evening at home" and the shops offered video and DVD rental alongside sweets until as recently as 2020.
Failing that, every supermarket, big or small, will have Swedish candy for sale, both in bags for popular varieties such as bilar (cars) surskallar (sour skulls), and gummibjörn (gummy bears), and a small pick-and-mix section. But then you miss out on the sheer visual impact of 500 or more varieties of sweets laid out in aisles.
Stockholm
House of Candy, on Stockholm's main shopping street Drottninggatan, aims to have the city's largest selection of pick-and-mix sweets and boasts more than 450 varieties, both factory produced and some more artisanal.
Caramella, at Hötorget in central Stockholm, is a more traditional sweet shop that sells both upmarket artisanal sweets and the standard varieties.
Svea Godis on Sveagatan, a little further from the centre, boasts a decent selection crammed into a relatively small shop.
To find a branch of Hemmakväll in Stockholm, you have to leave the city centre. There's one in Hammarby, just south of Södermalm, another in Sundbyberg, and another in the Kista Galleria shopping centre.
Gothenburg
In Gothenburg, there's a branch of Hemmakväll in the Odinsplatsen square, right by the central station, which makes it an easy place to stock up before leaving for the airport.
The city also boasts the 4-Gott sweet shop on Östra Hamngatan in the city centre, which claims to have over 1,000 varieties of sweets in its pick-and-mix section.
Sega Gubben, on Övre Husargatan in the city centre, boasts 600 varieties, while in the upmarket Majorna district there's Godis Stan.
Malmö
In Malmö, you have to leave the city centre and go up the Amiralsgatan street to the old concert hall building to find the nearest branch of Hemmakväll. There is also a branch in the Triangeln shopping centre.
The city also boasts two branches of Sweeet, a much smaller local challenger to Hemmakväll, one on Mariedalsvägen, a short walk from the Slottparken and Pildammsparken parks, and another on Nobelvägen, close to the popular Folkets Park.
Candy Airlines on the E4 motorway in the north of Skåne is a popular place to break off long car journeys. Photo: GodisflygetOutside the big cities
Perhaps the most striking sweet shop in Sweden is Godisflyget, or "Candy Airlines", which is housed in a building shaped like an aeroplane on the side of the E4 motorway as it enters Skåne from Småland. The shop is a great place for families with children to break off their journey, and sells more than 400 varieties of sweets at reasonable prices.
The pretty town of Gränna on the banks of Lake Vättern is another excellent place for people journeying between southern and northern Sweden to break off their journeys, with its many artisanal manufacturers of polkagris, Sweden's answer to candy canes. This isn't the place to buy the sort of sweets that are viral on TikTok, however.
Sweden's biggest sweet shops are the ones on the borders of Norway and Finland, catering to border shoppers who buy much cheaper Swedish sweets in bulk at the same time as stocking up on alcohol and food.
The Norwegian border is dominated by Gottebiten, which has branches at Nordby, Strömstad, Svinesund, and Charlottenberg. On the Finnish border, there's Candy World, a giant warehouse in Haparanda.
Candy World also has branches in Sundsvall, Borlänge, and Gävle and has plans to open warehouses in Örebro and Norrköping.
Comments