Gisela,
Congratulations on the popular candy and your success so far. It's great to see. My
company is also in the food space (sous vide, consumer electronics). We were initially crowd-funded. We
set the record for the food category in 2013 on Kickstarter.
My personal experience also included fundraising for my previous startup in medical software and fuel cell; and I do due diligence for a few Angel groups.
I agree with Chris above, that getting funding for "food" is going to be very difficult. Besides the patent issue, remember that most Angels would invest in early stage companies that already have good revenue and can show traction (and a market size). The days of "taking big risk on ideas" is basically over.
The other problem with the food category is that generally food products don't enjoy explosive growth. It's almost always fairly organic. Unfortunately, most Angels are looking for 5X minimum return (some set the minimum at 10X) in under 5 years. That translates to consistent 38% growth of the company's valuation per year. That's very difficult to do for consumer products/food because you most likely would run out of cash at that rate (and that's why you would need investment!). It's a dilemma.
Your exit strategy is most likely going to be an acquisition, so what you should be thinking is how you can make your company attractive to potential buyers (consumer base & branding), and who those buyer are. That said, acquisition in the food space is not exactly very active.
If I were you, I'd try to find as much non-diluting funding sources as you can (like Kickstarter or friends & family, or line of credit) to build up as much value for your company as quickly as possible. After that, with a good pitch, and a lot of networking, you may be able to find investors. I can tell you that there are investors in the food space, I know some, they are all former CEO/COO etc. of other food companies and they understand the space. You may be able to find them on LinkedIn; just reach out. Many are happy to help food-related entrepreneurs, just don't expect to hear from all of them when you reach out to them. But I am quite positive, that if you have a good pitch of your product and a show of traction, some will reply.
For food, you are right, if you have celebrity chef/personality backing, the chance of you getting high growth would be higher. But the publicity must be continuous.
Best wishes!
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