Peeps Marshmallow Chicks The 27-Hour Chick: Speeding Up Tradition Peeps marshmallow treats were originally made by a small, family-owned company called Rodda Candy Company. The process for creating them was astonishingly slow and laborious: each individual Peep was piped by hand, taking 27 grueling hours to produce a single batch, limiting production severely for seasonal peaks like Easter and Christmas. ​The accidental success came in 1953 when the process was acquired by the Just Born company.