Chocolatiers forced into price rise by cocoa cost

CHOCOLATE businesses in the Henley area say they are being affected by the rising price in raw ingredients.

Extreme weather and under-investment in farms in West Africa have disrupted cocoa bean plantations.

Severe drought conditions hit the region last year and in December 2023 it experienced intense rains.

The wet and humid conditions allowed a fungal infection called black pod disease to flourish, rotting cocoa beans on the tree which reduced crop yields.

Matthew Stone, the owner of Gorvett & Stone in Duke Street, Henley, said he has had to put up the price of products twice in the last 18 months.

He said the market has been volatile for the last few years and that the cost of cocoa beans has more than doubled in the last 12 months.

Mr Stone said: “The commodity price is now 300 per cent more than it was two years ago. And, just before Christmas, it was 500 per cent higher so prices are up massively. The contract that we sign is for six or 12 months and is based on the cocoa commodity price on that day.

“The market is very volatile because of climate change and various issues, mostly in West Africa. It has massively affected us. I think we’ve had to make two 10 per cent rises in our prices in the last 18 months.

“I never imagined when I opened a chocolate shop that I’d have to be checking the cocoa commodity price on the New York Stock Exchange and the London Stock Exchange. On one day it came down seven per cent but then recently it went up eight per cent in a day.”

Mr Stone said the most difficult issue is selling wholesale because of the increase. He said: “We sell chocolate in the shop at a retail price but if we sell to a deli or a farm shop we have to sell to them at a lower wholesale price so that they can still sell it. For business-to-business wholesale, the rise in costs has made a massive difference.”

Joy Skipper launched her chocolate making business Joyous in Stoke Row about a year ago. Her products are made in small batches in her home in Main Street.

Within four months she had to change her cocoa bean supplier and the subsequent search to find high quality beans at an affordable price was like a “treasure hunt”.

Mrs Skipper said: “The sup- plier I had wasn’t buying them because the price was too high and they didn’t believe they could sell them. I’m having to hunt around to find beans at a price I can make chocolate at and it’s making me go to different countries to find different beans.

“I started off with beans from El Salvador and Tanzania and now I’m making chocolate with beans from Ghana, Ecuador and Columbia and I suspect I’ll have to change again at some point when I can’t get hold of those.”

Mrs Skipper is hesitant to put her prices up for her customers but she may have little choice but to do so.

She said: “I don’t want to increase my prices for my consumers because they’re just starting out on this bean to bar journey, learning what bean to bar chocolate is.

“I’m having to take the brunt of it, which I’m happy to do because I feel quite strongly that people should pay a good price for good quality chocolate. But if it keeps going up, there’s a point where I will have to say, ‘I can’t do this anymore’, which will be sad.”

She is currently buying with other chocolate makers including one in Suffolk who has cocoa beans from Ecuador and another in London where they are sharing a batch from Columbia.

Mrs Skipper said: “The cost started to go up slowly but then it very quickly increased and, talking to cacao farmers and plantation owners, we realised that there was a bad harvest.

“The farmers have not been paid a very fair price over the years so they haven’t reinvested in their farms. They haven’t replanted so there’s no future yield coming through. It’s a number of things that have caused it.

“I talk to other chocolate makers from around the world. I’m in touch with quite a few people in India and Amsterdam and we all have the same trouble. We keep asking ourselves whether we put our prices up or do we just hang on and hope that the price comes down?”

Rosie Adey, 37, owns Rosie’s Chocolate Factory in Wargrave, which she has run for 10 years.

The business provides chocolate making experiences and workshops and she sells products online. She has increased prices and has also been trialling different products to reduce costs.

Ms Adey said: “I have been trialling other things but I tend to stick with the products even if there has been a price increase because the quality is really important to me.

“Since covid, things like hairnets and aprons have skyrocketed but nothing compares to the cost of chocolate, which is the main part of my business. There’s nothing comparable to how much it has gone up by now.”

She added: “My customers have been amazingly supportive so I’ve only put prices up when I've really had to.”

Vivienne Lee, who owns the Chocolate Café, in Thames Side, Henley, said: “We have been impacted because the price of cocoa has gone up by 300 per cent but the chocolate is still a good seller.”