“We are forced to increase”: as the Christmas holidays approach, chocolate prices are soaring

You’ve probably already noticed: on the supermarket shelves, Christmas chocolates are ready to be devoured by those with a sweet tooth for the holidays. However, when looking at the label, the consumer has a very unpleasant surprise: it is much, much, more expensive! In one year, the price of chocolate bars has increased by around ten cents. An increase which also affects bakeries and chocolate shops.

Specifically, a ton of cocoa went from less than 3,000 euros last year to almost 9,000 euros today. As Christmas approaches, it is therefore a headache for traders, with the end-of-year holidays representing a large part of their turnover: “We are necessarily obliged to increase, but we are trying to find alternatives that will allow us to impose less of this increase on customers,” explains Claude Déat, manager of a chocolate factory, interviewed by TF1’s 1 p.m. in the subject at the top of this article. “Instead of making very thick boxes, we decided to make much lighter boxes, which are just as beautiful and which will weigh a little less on the price of the chocolate.”

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Less expensive packaging, but still just as much chocolate inside. At the origin of this historic increase, poor harvests in Africa. “Clearly, climatic hazards come into account,” explains Tiphaine Corvez, chocolatier, to TF1. “There is also the fact that the problem is very much in Ivory Coast and Ghana, which are countries where there have been a lot of monocultures and intensive crops. And inevitably, the soil is exhausted, therefore the harvests are less good.” Professionals hope for better harvests next year, but fear that the rise in prices will continue until spring.