Chocoa Competitors

Luxury British cacao grower and chocolatier Hotel Chocolat was founded to make people happy through chocolate! Co-founders Angus Thirlwell and Peter Harris built the brand on three unwavering pillars – Originality, Authenticity and Ethics – that remain central to the brand’s success. Starting as an early online brand, the first Hotel Chocolat store opened in Hertfordshire in 2004, and its manager is still at the helm. Today, we have more than 120 Hotel Chocolat's across the UK, with a multi-million strong online global customer database. In the grounds of our eco-conscious, organic cacao farm in Saint Lucia we have also created an amazing visitor experience Project Chocolat, together with the award-winning Rabot Hotel and Restaurant. One of the few chocolate makers to actually grow cacao, we connect the world of sustainable agriculture with the hedonism of top-quality chocolate. This knowledge has enabled us to bring an innovative Gentle Farming programme into the world, bringing to our cacao growing communities enough money for a happy life whilst supporting a bio-diverse, climate smart farming technique. The Hotel Chocolat team has a strong set of cultural values best summarised as ‘Be brave. Be kind.’ We’re just getting started. Come and be a part of what’s next.

Valrhona’s story began in 1922 with passion, commitment and excellence as its guiding lights. Ever since, these three values have paved our way, allowing us to push back the boundaries of creativity and flavor. Alongside our partners and customers, we imagine the best of chocolate every day. We do this in the way we select and cultivate cocoa, preserving the diversity of different terroirs and prioritizing sustainable links with our partner plantations. We do this when we make our chocolate and expand the aromatic palette, supplying all artisans with unique materials that let them express their creativity and unleash their talent. We do this by passing on flavor and savoir-faire, putting our expertise at the service of artisans and the gastronomy world. By partnering with a wide range of chocolate lovers and chocolate professionals, we can continue to bring out the best in our material, expressing and developing its infinite multitude of flavors. Valrhona. Let’s imagine the best of chocolate.

Dandelion Chocolate is a bean-to-bar chocolate factory that began in the Mission District of San Francisco. In early 2010, we opened our doors on Valencia Street after sharing our love of small-batch, single-origin chocolate with our friends and family for years. We source all of our cocoa beans ourselves and travel to origin to forge a mutually-beneficial relationship with global partners who grow and ferment cacao. We then roast, crack, sort, winnow, grind, refine, and temper small batches of beans, and then mold and package each bar. By sourcing high quality cocoa beans and carefully crafting them, we try to bring out the individual flavors and nuances of each bean. Since then, we have opened more locations in San Francisco and one in Las Vegas. We produce out chocolate in our factory on 16th Street in San Francisco. In addition, our 16th Street factory is also home to our own pastry kitchen, Bloom chocolate salon, and confections kitchen. In addition to making our own chocolate and confections, we stock our shelves with bonbons and confections we make with collaborators we admire. Stop by our 16th Street Factory for a tour, classes on sourcing and making single-origin chocolate, or to see our chocolate makers in action while sipping a cup of hot chocolate. Many thanks, Todd