Why is Hershey's afraid of British chocolate?

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Why is Hershey's afraid of British chocolate?

Postby semper occultus » Tue Jan 27, 2015 12:09 pm

Why is Hershey's afraid of British chocolate?

The US confectionery giant is blocking the import of British favourites such as Cadbury, but many Americans have a growing taste for good chocolate

By Andrew Baker3:30PM GMT 26 Jan 2015

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/foodanddrink ... olate.html

American-based fans of British chocolate have been left reeling at Hershey's action to ban their favourite bars from the US.

The American confectionery giant has blocked the importation of such British-made favourites as Dairy Milk, KitKat, Toffee Crisp and Maltesers.
Hershey's has the right to manufacture some Cadbury's products in the US, using different ingredients from the British originals but often selling them under the same names and in similar packaging.

Hershey's claims that by blocking the importation of the British versions - which have hitherto been sold by niche retailers in the US - they are preventing consumers from being "confused or misled".
It will seem more likely to anyone who has ever tasted Hershey's own-brand products, and its approximations of Cadbury's, that they are instead preventing consumers from buying products which taste much better than Hershey's own.

Shrieks from deprived American consumers on social media indicate that Hershey's action is not appreciated by the kind of consumer who can tell good chocolate from bad.
The kind of consumer, for example, who can read the ingredients on a British-made Cadbury's Dairy Milk bar, where the first ingredient listed is "milk", and then read the ingredients of an American-made Cadbury's Dairy Milk bar, where the first ingredient listed is "sugar".

I have talked to many American fans of chocolate and found them universally keen to point out that Hershey's makes "candy bars", not chocolate bars. They emphasise that a Hershey bar contains only 11 percent cocoa, while a British-made Dairy Milk bar - hardly a gourmet product - contains almost twice as much cocoa, at 20 per cent.

Now, it seems, Hershey's wish to stamp out chocolate bars that actually taste of chocolate, lest American consumers develop a taste for the real thing.

But they may be too late. The US craft chocolate industry is booming as consumers turn away from fat-and-sugar-laden imitations, and the artisan producers scale up their operations and move out of their original strongholds on the West Coast towards a nationwide audience.

In fact makers of real American chocolate are expanding their European operations, even as the candy giants try to shut the doors at home. Soon Mast Brothers of New York will open a factory/cafe/shop in Shoreditch in opinion-forming east London.

Not all Americans, it would seem, are afraid of real chocolate.
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Re: Why is Hershey's afraid of British chocolate?

Postby lucky » Wed Jan 28, 2015 8:42 am

My wife brought back some Hersheys chocolate some time ago and i was amazed how disgusting it tasted, a mixture of vomit and Parmesan - really I'm not exagerating It wasn't a one off as i have tried it a number of times since bleeuugghhh . I love chocolate from the 70%+ to good old 25% cadbury's but how anyone can eat hersheys i find incredulous.
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Re: Why is Hershey's afraid of British chocolate?

Postby semper occultus » Wed Jan 28, 2015 9:18 am

...yeah I had some once - milk choc & a bar with peanuts in it iirc.....god it was shocking....like wax or something & basically unedible......& I'm a serious chocaholic

...so much for free trade though eh...
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Re: Why is Hershey's afraid of British chocolate?

Postby Pele'sDaughter » Wed Jan 28, 2015 9:23 am

Yes, Hershey makes awful "chocolate". We buy the artisan-type 70% chocolate. They're delicious. Otherwise, we buy Lindt. :lovehearts:
Don't believe anything they say.
And at the same time,
Don't believe that they say anything without a reason.
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Re: Why is Hershey's afraid of British chocolate?

Postby coffin_dodger » Wed Jan 28, 2015 9:48 am

Lindt. :lovehearts:
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Re: Why is Hershey's afraid of British chocolate?

Postby 82_28 » Wed Jan 28, 2015 10:18 am

Bear in mind that there was a time in which chocolate had to be marketed to people who were not accustomed to it being something you just bought. It was a market ripe for the picking. Thus, Hershey's was born because it was totally just "sitting right there". A lot of shit we know of as "brand names" were because someone recognized the money to be made.

Think of Ketchup or catsup. There was and is a whole host of shit that when you sit down and think about it are stupid and we just line up and accept it as reality. I recently made an impulse buy of a bag of snickers "party size" because they were just sitting there. A bag for like $2. I was like "fuck it". I bought it. Job done -- two bucks extracted from me. I remember when I was a kid that I would always buy the biggest, "KING SIZE" chocolate bar.

Another thing is that the reason I bought the snickers was because the JINGLE of SNICKERS SATISFIES YOU still exists in my programming. I freely admit I have been programmed. Because I noticed it. I didn't seek the candy out. It was just there and at the right price in which I felt like I was spending next to nothing. Throw it onto the stand. Money made!
Last edited by 82_28 on Wed Jan 28, 2015 10:55 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Why is Hershey's afraid of British chocolate?

Postby semper occultus » Wed Jan 28, 2015 10:27 am

Image

...I want a job in one of their factories....
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Re: Why is Hershey's afraid of British chocolate?

Postby Nordic » Thu Jan 29, 2015 12:54 am

Snobs! All of you!

Just kidding. I wish I could afford really good chocolate, like all the time. Shit's expensive.
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Re: Why is Hershey's afraid of British chocolate?

Postby Elvis » Thu Jan 29, 2015 4:18 am

A friend made this film last year (this is just the trailer):

BEAN TO BAR Film Trailer, a film about artisan chocolate

www.youtube.com/watch?v=38UZns5x1f4


This film focuses on the artisan chocolate makers renaissance in the United States. Offering exotic tastes, textures and variety unavailable in our industrialized food industry, these artisan chocolate makers are celebrated and praised by food critics and chocolate lovers alike.
Their passion for excellence through quality over quantity and a working relationship with the farmers, has led to a modern day revival of chocolate's mystery and allure.

http://www.beantobarfilm.com.
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Re: Why is Hershey's afraid of British chocolate?

Postby jingofever » Thu Jan 29, 2015 6:13 am

Image
American chocolate is not just Hershey's. We have Russell Stover (now owned by Lindt) and Ghirardelli (a division of Lindt) and Mars, which makes all of the "candy bars" that Americans are familiar with, minus the Mounds Bar and Kit Kat, Hershey's products. Sorry for linking to a Family Guy clip, but it does accurately represent our feelings towards a Mounds Bar:



The only chocolate I consume is Hershey's cocoa powder which I mix into hot water. I despise weaklings who think anything lower than 100% cocoa is "real" chocolate.

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All you need. You can probably snort it too.
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Re: Why is Hershey's afraid of British chocolate?

Postby semper occultus » Mon Jul 04, 2016 8:23 am

I see Mondelez is now after Hershey's having swallowed Cadbury's...these sort of attempted monopolies are pernicious & should be illegal...

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/01/business/dealbook/hershey-mondelez-takeover-bid.html?_r=0
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Re: Why is Hershey's afraid of British chocolate?

Postby semper occultus » Tue Nov 08, 2016 5:53 am

....Mondelez are having a ****in' laugh...!

( evil, evil company )

Toblerone triangle change upsets fans

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-37904703

Image

Some fans of Toblerone's distinctive triangular chocolate chunks are feeling down in the mouth after the look of two bars sold in the UK was changed.
Mondelez International, the company behind the product, has increased the gap between the peaks to reduce the weight of what were 400g and 170g bars.
Some consumers have described the move as "the wrong decision" and said the bigger spaces looked "stupid".
Mondelez said the move was down to the rise in the cost of ingredients.
In a statement on the Toblerone Facebook page, the company said it had to make a decision between changing the look of the bars or raising the price.
The move has resulted in the weight of the 400g bars being reduced to 360g and the 170g bars to 150g, while the size of the packaging has remained the same.
It said: "We chose to change the shape to keep the product affordable for our customers."
'Why the big gap?'
But consumers took to Toblerone's Facebook page to question why the company had decided to make the gaps between the triangles bigger, rather than reducing the length of the bars.
Lee Yarker said: "Fair enough reducing the weight of the bar, but why the big gap in between segments? Looks stupid imo [in my opinion], could have just made the bar shorter and kept the original design."
Philip Joseph wrote: "It was the wrong decision. It looks like a really underhanded thing to do.
"You buy a bar expecting a normal bar and it looks like you are getting half the chocolate."
Cathy White added: "It looks dreadful. Think you should've reduced the length and kept the chunky triangles."

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Re: Why is Hershey's afraid of British chocolate?

Postby identity » Tue Nov 08, 2016 7:07 am

Motherfuckers. I used to eat Green & Black's Milk Chocolate and Almond bar ALL the time. Whole almonds in organic milk chocolate (would usually stock up when they went on sale). Last year, they (G&B/Mondelez) shifted production from Italy to Poland, and at the same time began using little pieces of chopped almond instead of whole almonds while also using an inferior quality of chocolate. That was it for me. And now there's really nothing else on the market that compares flavour/texture-wise to that G&B bar. :(
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Re: Why is Hershey's afraid of British chocolate?

Postby smoking since 1879 » Tue Nov 08, 2016 12:21 pm

I notice they didn't put it in a smaller box - can't lose shelf-space eh? - lying, cheating c**ts

oh, and mondelez also own the milka brand.

"As short a time ago as February, the Ministry of Plenty had issued a promise (a 'categorical pledge' were the official words) that there would be no reduction of the chocolate ration during 1984. Actually, as Winston was aware, the chocolate ration was to be reduced from thirty grammes to twenty at the end of the present week. All that was needed was to substitute for the original promise a warning that it would probably be necessary to reduce the ration at some time in April."

... i'm sure there's an Orwell quote someplace along the lines of "the corporation will feed you" but i'm darned if i can find it ... any one ?
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Re: Why is Hershey's afraid of British chocolate?

Postby KUAN » Tue Nov 08, 2016 1:42 pm

Most manufacturers overdo the sugar and then the healthy ones sometimes go too far the other way
% sugar and % cocoa should be prominent on the label ...
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