Hillsboro: Hitting the sweet spot
Staff writer
Emily Frantz will breathe a sigh of relief when six blocks of Main St. in Hillsboro close from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday for Arts and Crafts Fair.
Days leading up to the annual event are hectic. As sole owner and operator of Frantz Cookie Co., she expects to make 130 dozen baked goods for a crowd that could top 10,000.
“It’s kind of a celebration, especially for me,” Frantz said, taking a break from moving batches in and out of an oven at her Hillsboro home. “Everybody’s excited to get the cookies. I’m excited to be done baking the cookies, and just get to see people and talk to people all day long.”
Frantz isn’t alone. More than 200 vendors, Arts and Crafts Association director Amelia Breugem said, will fill tents and canopies with all things handmade from Frantz’s cookies to garden art.
Some vendors will travel from as far as Texas and Florida, and 50 new ones will join the day’s activities.
“I’ve had somebody from Salina drive down to Hillsboro just to buy cookies,” Frantz said. “They came, bought cookies, and then they just left.”
Since the event began in 1970, Breugem said, the goal has been to bring business to Marion County.
Some years brought as many as 30,000 people for the one-day event, though the COVID-19 pandemic reduced attendance in recent years.
The fair has taken on somewhat of a newer meaning.
“It brings the community together for a shared purpose,” Breugem said. “Art is just fun. Everyone loves arts and crafts. It’s something that everyone enjoys at every age.
“And people have traditions around coming to the Arts and Crafts Fair. They bring their families, their girlfriends. Reunions happen at the Arts and Crafts Fair. It’s just a fun day.”
That sense of community is baked into Frantz’s work. Growing up in Roxbury’s 4-H club, she always cooked — though she never liked washing dishes.
It wasn’t until she went to Kansas State University that her joy of baking took off. While a Wildcat, she studied journalism, which led to public relations before doing some graphic design.
Frantz graduated there with a dual major.
“I went through journalism to get to graphic design because I could not be an art major,” she said.
It was along that winding path that Frantz’s aunt’s sugar cookie recipe became the backbone of her business. A few tweaks here and there with ingredients and proportions made it her own, and she used her graphic design skills to create “over-the-top” patterns of icing.
By 2020, orders from people outside of her circle started coming in. Especially around Christmas, she fills orders that approach 50 dozen.
“As a graphic designer, I was doing logos, and I was working at a T-shirt and printing shop,” Frantz said. “Then I started doing cookies. I would design my cookies on my computer, and then make them.”
Frantz’s cookies this year will feature fall themes including pumpkins, sunflowers and footballs. Cookies can be bought at $3 to $5 each.