Food & Beverage

New Braunfels residents will soon have another place to meet for an afternoon pick-me-up, a family dessert run or a drink designed to look nearly as memorable as it tastes.

Candy Cloud, an emerging specialty beverage and dessert franchise known for serving colorful drinks in clear, can-shaped containers, has leased 1,660 square feet of retail space at New Braunfels Town Center at Creekside, according to commercial real estate firm NewQuest.

The café will be located within the major shopping and entertainment district at Interstate 35 and FM 306. An anticipated opening date and the exact storefront location within the development have not yet been announced.

For the community, the lease represents more than another beverage shop. It brings a young, family-founded brand with an unusually personal beginning to one of the busiest retail corridors connecting New Braunfels with San Antonio, Austin and surrounding Hill Country communities.

Candy Cloud will open its second Texas café in New Braunfels

The New Braunfels location will expand Candy Cloud’s Texas presence beyond its existing café at 11619 Bandera Road, Suite 106, in San Antonio. That store celebrated its grand opening in June 2025 and became the Illinois-based company’s first Texas location.

Candy Cloud’s current and developing footprint reaches several parts of the country, including Illinois, Wisconsin, Ohio, Tennessee, Florida, Colorado and Texas. Its location directory includes operating cafés in communities such as Rockford, DeKalb, Glenview, Downers Grove, South Elgin, Oswego, Joliet, Madison, Middleton, Smyrna, Jacksonville, Columbus and Willoughby, along with additional locations listed as coming soon in Commerce City, Brookfield and Miami. Because Candy Cloud is actively franchising, its store count and development pipeline continue to change.

The expansion gives New Braunfels the brand’s second foothold in Texas and places the café roughly between the San Antonio and Austin metropolitan areas, where a growing population and steady visitor traffic have continued to attract new restaurants, retailers and entertainment concepts.

A beverage shop built from a family’s loss and perseverance

Candy Cloud’s polished drinks and playful menu grew from a difficult chapter in founders Alex and Paityn Edwards’ lives.

After the couple lost their daughter, Evelyn, the flowers they received from loved ones became a source of comfort. That experience inspired Evelyn’s Acre, a flower-growing venture that sold bouquets from a renovated trailer at farmers markets. When flowers alone did not attract enough customers, the Edwardses began adding food-oriented offerings, beginning with fresh cotton candy.

The mobile concept launched in the Rockford, Illinois, area in summer 2019 and later added Hawaiian shave ice and other treats. Alex Edwards left his firefighting career in 2020 as the family committed more fully to the business.

Experimentation followed. Homemade horchata, strawberry lemonade and iced coffee gradually shifted Candy Cloud from a sweets stand toward an all-day specialty beverage concept. Its canned drinks became an important source of repeat business by 2021, and the family opened its first permanent Rockford café in 2022 before launching a franchise program later that year.

The Edwards family continues to lead the privately held brand and its franchising operation, although individual Candy Cloud cafés may be owned and operated by local franchisees.

That origin story remains part of the company’s identity: building something joyful after profound loss and creating a place where families and friends can make new memories together.

What is on the Candy Cloud menu?

Candy Cloud is designed to occupy the space between a coffee shop, boba café, soda bar and dessert destination.

The core menu includes artisan coffee, iced and shaken espresso drinks, matcha, milk tea, smoothies, fresh-squeezed lemonade, horchata, boba, dessert shakes, energy drinks and soft serve. The company also rotates limited-time collections throughout the year, giving returning customers new seasonal flavors to try.

Signature and featured drinks have included Brown Sugar Boba, Strawberry Matcha, Golden Hour Chai, Vanilla Bean Latte, Butterfly Lavender Lemonade, Mango Dragonfruit ReVibe and layered soft-serve creations such as Birthday Cake, Dirt Pie, Cookie Butter Dream and Peanut Butter Cup.

Customers can also build their own soft-serve combinations with toppings, drizzles and boba. Food offerings shown on the brand’s menu include grilled cheese, bacon-and-egg melts, jalapeño bacon melts, pretzel bites, cinnamon-sugar doughnut bites and cake pops.

The broad selection is intentional. A parent looking for coffee, a teenager ordering boba, a child choosing soft serve and someone seeking a non-coffee energy drink can all find something under the same roof. Candy Cloud describes itself as a specialty drink café rather than limiting the concept to a traditional coffeehouse or dessert shop.

Clear cans help make the drinks recognizable

One of Candy Cloud’s most distinctive features is its packaging.

Many drinks are prepared in tall, transparent containers resembling beverage cans, allowing layers of fruit purée, milk, coffee, syrups, boba and whipped toppings to remain visible. The drinks are sealed after preparation, combining grab-and-go convenience with a presentation made for photographs and social media.

That visual approach has helped the brand stand apart in a crowded specialty beverage market. Instead of relying on a single category, Candy Cloud combines familiar coffeehouse choices with dessert-inspired shakes, brightly colored lemonades and customizable energy drinks.

The company also promotes convenience and relatively quick order preparation as central parts of its business model, positioning its cafés for morning coffee stops, after-school visits, afternoon refreshers and evening dessert outings.

Creekside continues to grow as a New Braunfels destination

Candy Cloud is joining a retail center that already serves as a regional gathering place for shopping, dining and entertainment.

New Braunfels Town Center at Creekside spans more than 400 acres and includes more than 1 million square feet of existing retail space near I-35 and FM 306. The mixed-use development draws customers from New Braunfels, Seguin, Canyon Lake, San Marcos and other communities along the Interstate 35 corridor.

NewQuest has also been advancing a roughly 100,000-square-foot expansion at Creekside, with additional specialty retail, dining and entertainment uses planned. Recent development activity has included EoS Fitness, Topgolf and the first Sprouts Farmers Market in Comal County, further strengthening the area as a destination where residents can combine errands, meals and recreation in one trip.

For Candy Cloud, the location offers access to local families, students, commuters and visitors. For New Braunfels residents, it adds another homegrown-feeling gathering option to a corridor increasingly shaped by both national retailers and newer regional concepts.

What happens next

Candy Cloud and NewQuest have not yet released an opening timeline, operating hours, hiring information or details about the franchisee behind the New Braunfels café.

As construction and opening plans move forward, residents can expect more information about the shop’s location within Creekside, its grand-opening schedule and whether the New Braunfels menu will feature any locally inspired or store-exclusive drinks.

Stay tuned to My Neighborhood News for updates on the Candy Cloud New Braunfels opening, new Creekside restaurants and continued retail development across Comal County.

By Tiffany Krenek, My Neighborhood News 

Tiffany Krenek has been on the My Neighborhood News team since August 2021. She is passionate about curating and sharing content that enriches the lives of our readers in a personal, meaningful way. A loving mother and wife, Tiffany and her family live in the West Houston/Cypress region.