Foie gras, log, smoked salmon… and the essential chocolates will not be missing on the Christmas table. For chocolatiers, this is a prosperous period, often the most important season of the year. More than 30,000 tons of chocolate were sold in France during the last Christmas holidays, which meant a turnover close to 700 million euros, according to figures from the Syndicat du chocolat. Filled chocolates, chocolates with alcohol, truffles or even molds in the shape of Santa Claus: production is running at full speed to satisfy consumers.
“We tripled our workforce to meet demand,” explains Solène Roelandts, president of the Puyricard chocolate factory. The family business manufactures most of its products sold at Christmas during the month of December. Its manufacturing workshops, north of Aix-en-Provence, continue to produce chocolates but also calissons, fruit jellies and marshmallows to supply the company’s twenty stores. There is no room for error: the Provençal company reaches 45% of its turnover in the three weeks before Christmas.
In southern Alsace, Abtey is also looking forward to December 25. The company, also family-owned, operates on a purely seasonal basis: its chocolates are sold in mass distribution only at Christmas and Easter. No trim in December: Abtey’s big specialty is booze pralines for adults and treetop parasols for kids. With an average of 700 tons of chocolate, Christmas accounts for 55% of the turnover of the Alsatian SME, also oriented towards export.
“We’ve never seen that”
But inflation runs the risk of spoiling the chocolatiers’ party, after having already experienced a complicated Easter holiday. “Chocolate has increased by 35%. It’s huge, we’ve never seen that before,” said Anne-Catherine Wagner, director of the Alsace chocolate factory. Raw materials, energy, packaging… Production costs increase in all directions. “You have to check all the recipes,” explains Parisian chocolatier Jean-Paul Hévin. The artisan also mentions the rise in wages, a substantial increase in a sector that requires a lot of labor.
In fact, a price increase seems inevitable. Almost all of the chocolatiers surveyed say they have raised the prices of some of their products to stay afloat. “We can’t absorb everything at our already tight margins, and “I don’t want to buy lower-quality raw materials,” confirms Solène Roelandts. It is also difficult for these companies to review their manufacturing process. After almost three years of health crisis and after very high production costs, optimization has already been pushed to the maximum.
On the side of the Belgian chocolatier Leonidas, we assure that there will be no increase in the prices of their chocolates. “We have decided not to pass on our cost increases in the sale price and lose margin,” says Philippe de Selliers, general manager of Leonidas. The Belgian company has 300 stores in France and generates a third of its turnover in the last two months of the year. “But we hope that the consumer will return it to us by coming to our stores more often,” the manager hopes.
Concern for Easter 2023
Because consumption in this inflationary context is worrisome. The first negative signals had upset manufacturers: in this period of rising prices, the French could be tempted to arbitrage. The budget is not extensible and the chocolate risks paying the price. “Our customers don’t come less frequently, but they buy a little less than usual,” underlines Solène Roelandts. All of them are, however, optimistic, betting on the wishes of consumers in view of the proximity of Christmas, a time traditionally of low spending.
If the French often prefer to have fun rather than restrict themselves at Christmas, it is less obvious at Easter. Inflation will likely run its course through the first few months of the year, and for chocolatiers, reaction could drop at that time.
Source: BFM TV
