We love/hate summer!

The whole nation smiles when the UK finally get good weather, unless you run a chocolate business – then we grin through gritted-teeth, quietly move to ‘code yellow’ and anxiously, hourly check the weather forecast.

The short answer on how we manage hot weather is shown below...

This past week, with an early heat-blast, we’ve been caught-out selling-through the last remaining Easter Eggs…

We know every year, like every chocolate business, there will be about 2-3 weeks of weather when it’s too hot to post – but equally there’s no way of predicting when they’ll be.

Our priority is always to ensure that the chocolates arrive in the best possible condition. Our chocs are made with real food like fresh organic cream and butter – and while they are not materially more ‘melty’ than other chocolates, they do need looking after.

Over the past couple of years, we've tested multiple packaging configurations and insulation options across different temperatures on different days, and this is what we found…

1.   Our customers want to spend money on the chocolates, not packaging or posting
2.   We don’t need fancy solutions - the most (cost)effective packaging is the simplest – one ice-block with lots of sizzle paper (creates lots of air that keeps beautifully cool)
3.   Above 25 degrees, things get tricky, unless you’re using ‘Rolls Royce’ layers of insultation that are always expensive and often massively wasteful

Sometimes events are beyond our control:

·    Van saunas – a delivery van that bakes in the sun before picking-up the parcels

·    A ‘porch of doom’ usually glass-enclosed and south-facing, heating to nuclear temperatures by lunchtime

·    Lilliputian letterboxes – usually older and unhelpfully small – thus our chocolates occasionally get left outside IN THE SUN

So, for this summer, we have the following planned:

1. Ice-packs are freezing down as we speak
2.  We check the weather forecast daily if it’s looking very sunny/ hot (above 23 degrees) we’ll usually pause sending for a couple of days until the weather breaks
3.  We switch on ‘Express Plus Ice’ next week with loads of sizzle paper and a single big ice-pack – so you will have the option to upgrade to this if urgent

We’re still learning – our new boxes for Easter that snugly fit the Eggs were never intended to include an ice-pack (and therefore don’t) because “It’s never THAT hot in April” as Steve  and I discussed – so this week, we've been grateful for patience from customers who’ve been snapping-up the last remaining eggs and waiting a few days for cooler weather.

Things will always go wrong – thank goodness for the lovely Maria, looking after our customer service.

Oh, and we'll be bringing back Strawberries & Cream in June, so it's not all bad.

Enjoy the UK sunshine this week, even if we don’t!