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Now
one has popped up outside a Pittsburgh candy store.
Capitalizing on the intrigue surrounding the other monoliths and
hoping to provide a distraction from the daily drumbeat of
COVID-19 news, the owner of Grandpa Joe's Candy Shop,
Christopher Beers, commissioned a 10-foot tall, 24-inch wide
triangle of plywood covered in sheet metal.
"There is a mystery behind it," said Beers, even though he
stripped the whodunit angle from his monolith, which he freely
admits was designed to drive up candy sales.
Beers said he was captivated by sculptures that made headlines
starting in November, the first appearing in Utah's Red Rock
Country, vaguely resembling the so-called monoliths in Stanley
Kubrick's 1968 film "2001: A Space Odyssey."
He enlisted a colleague to erect a similar enigma outside his
store. One Facebook post was all it took to generate a media
buzz around the "mysterious" metallic creation.
"Hopefully, it's a reminder to support small, local businesses
that have been so badly hit" by COVID-19, said Beers, owner of
the independent chain of 10 candy stores in Pennsylvania and
Ohio.
"And isn't it fun to have something to talk about beside the
pandemic?!"
Since the monolith went up, business has been brisk at Grandpa
Joe's. Customers eagerly take selfies with the monolith before
heading inside to load up on Christmas sweets. The Facebook post
is also driving candy sales online.
"Come see the Monolith before it mysteriously disappears," said
a post on a Facebook page for Grandpa Joe's.
"Is it made out of chocolate?" commented one hopeful fan on the
page.
(Additional reporting and writing by Barbara Goldberg; Editing
by Richard Chang)
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