Then and Now: Adventure underlies Lauren Blanco’s decisions

Lauren Blanco, co-founder and owner of Markham & Fitz Chocolate, views life as an adventure. “It underlies a lot of decisions and how we’ve lived our lives so far,” she said, describing herself and husband, Mark.

After graduating from the University of Arkansas, adventure meant traveling to war-torn places in Central Africa to do development work, then starting a chocolate company. In October it meant “a big new adventure” of moving with their two toddlers to Brooklyn, N.Y.

Blanco’s favorite quote by English Christian apologist G.K. Chesterton sums up her perspective: “There are two ways of getting home, and one of them is to stay there. The other is to walk around the whole world until we come back to the same place.”

“The idea that leaving home always leads us back to the same place, kind of the same place within ourselves,” Blanco said. “It’s like the process of self-actualization, of finding what makes us come alive. We’re in a transition stage of life, moving to a new city, turning our lives upside down to figure out who we’re going to be in this next season of life now that we have two little kids. Who we’re going to be as parents and as a business owner.”

Blanco studied cultural anthropology and French at the UA, graduating in 2012. She worked for nonprofit ForgottenSong, focusing on grassroots economic development, mostly in poultry farming, in war-torn countries.

“That exposed me to business as a force of good,” she said. “I visited cacao farms and saw that business could holistically help people and communities through a stable source of income.”

At that point she and her co-workers started a chocolate company. “Chickens got me into chocolate somehow,” she joked.

A chocolate manufacturing company, Markham & Fitz processes cocoa beans to make chocolate. Also confectioners, the company makes truffles, caramels, and bonbons and has a chocolate café in Bentonville. The company’s wholesale business distributes its products across the United States, primarily to independent boutique stores. They supply Whole Foods Market, and that business tripled in the last year. In addition, its online business ships chocolates nationwide.

In 2025 company revenue was up 25% over 2024. Its chocolates have been featured in Anthropologie stores; O, The Oprah Magazine (now known as Oprah Daily); and on the “Today” show.

Honored in 2019 in the Northwest Arkansas Business Journal’s Forty Under 40 class, Blanco’s business kept the couple in Arkansas for a decade. Mark worked in consumer products, Blanco said, and wanted to use his marketing and data analytics experience and his apparel degree, so the move to New York allows him to pursue opportunities in the fashion industry.

“We felt like it was time to pursue his dream and see if I could run the business from here,” Blanco said. “It can feel risky and scary, but at the heart of it, it brings us joy and hope to our marriage, and to life in general, and what we can offer our children.”

Blanco is finding new networks in New York, writing a book and expanding Markham & Fitz’s corporate gifting and wholesale businesses.

“I’ve spent a lot of years grinding to build something,” she said. “But I’m in a season now where I’m trying to listen to my soul. That’s where I think writing comes in, and why I’m focused on it now. I think it’s reflective of the decades of life. As we’re in our 20s, we try to create an identity, prove to ourselves or other people who we are, and then we slowly start to figure out who it is we’ve always been. Now what motivates me is learning to listen to the soul and figuring out how to merge that with my business pursuits and other life goals.”

Running the business from New York is going well.

“I’m proud of my team, the ways they’ve stepped up in leadership in ways that wouldn’t have happened had I stayed,” she said. “So, I think that’s a real gift — learning to hand off leadership the way moving to New York forced me to do.”

Blanco serves on the board for Innovations in Peacebuilding and relaxes by reading and eating chocolate.