Posted on: Friday, June 3, 2005
Still famous, Amos back in business
By Dan Nakaso
Advertiser Staff Writer
Thirty years after he launched his Famous Amos line of cookies, Wally Amos plans to return to the business with a Kailua storefront offering cookies and books — and emphasizing reading aloud to children.
"The love that is transferred from the reader to the child can make a world of difference in that child's life forever," Amos said yesterday. "Ultimately our goal for parents is that they can gain wisdom so they can be better parents, build stronger families and build stronger communities."
Amos' Chip & Cookie store is based on characters created by his artist wife, Christine. It will offer five flavors of cookies, Chip & Cookie dolls, T-shirts and other related products.
Eventually he plans to expand to other stores, with each contributing 10 percent of the earnings to a new Chip & Cookie Read Aloud Foundation.
"You've got to start with one," Amos said. "But we're probably going to end up with 12 or 13 in Hawai'i."
He hopes to open the Kailua store by the end of July and perhaps as early as July 18.
Amos founded Famous Amos cookies in 1975 in Hawai'i after leaving a career as a William Morris talent agent in New York, where he worked with Simon & Garfunkel, the Supremes and other artists.
Famous Amos began running into financial trouble in later years and Amos was forced to gradually sell off portions of the company until 1985 when he sold majority interest. In the process he lost the right to use the name "Famous Amos" and even his own name in connection with food products.
Attempts to market his own cookies under the "Uncle Noname" banner didn't last and the "father of the gourmet chocolate-chip cookie" stopped selling his own creations.
Now Amos wants to give it another try with the new 750-square-foot Chip & Cookie store. The shop will include some of the five books written by Amos, best-selling children's books and a library so "parents and their children can sit around, have some cookies and read a little," Amos said.
Amos and Christine used to read to their daughter while she was still in the womb. A year later, "she'd run in, saying, 'Papa, Papa, read,' " Amos said.
Now 21, Sarah Amos just graduated from the University of Southern California and will work as a summer intern for ABC News in Los Angeles.
"Now this kid reads all of the time," Amos said. "It's really important that we understand how important reading aloud is."
Amos, who is in his late 60s, declined to give his age, calling it "irrelevant."
"Who cares how old I am?" he said. "What's important is that I've never been more excited or focused about a project. This will be my legacy."
Reach Dan Nakaso at dnakaso@honoluluadvertiser.com or at 525-8085.
Amos lives in Lanikai and sits on the board of the Hawai'i-based Read To Me International. He plans to work out of his new Chip & Cookie store on Kailua Road — next to Cold Stone Creamery — and read to some of the children who visit.
