Bittersweet news

Three things happened to disturb my chocolate-induced stupor this morning.

1) my ever-thoughtful husband bought me a small-but-perfectly-formed bar of Green and Black's Organic Chocolate for Easter.

This fulfilled a number of (I admit, sad) needs I have as a consumer right now, including allowing me to feel that I was purchasing a premium product that not only tastes good, but is made with fresh, quality ingredients, produced by a socially-responsible company operating on fair-trade principles, from a small localised producer vs a global corporate giant.

2) I came across this blog entry in my regular trawl through the NYT about big corporates gobbling up small organic producers

3) points (1) and (2) came crashing together with an unsettling 'thud' when said my husband casually mentioned that Cadbury recently acquired Green and Blacks.

Now it all makes sense.

Being the avid shopper that I am, it had recently come to my attention that my local Fresh Choice moved G&B from the gourmet section to the mainstream bit, where all run-of-the-mill middle-of-the-road chocolate is. At the time I just gave passing thought to this, but I did ponder the wisdom of it. After all, just being placed in the gourmet section has to lower price resistance and give the bars some added cachet. I certainly expect to pay more when I shop there.

Further investigation this morning turned up some interesting perspectives on the acquisition, with excitement about the mainstreaming of organics and the acquisition being described as 'the ultimate organic foods success story.

At first glance, I guess it is. At least for the G&B founders, who pocketed a tidy sum of money.

But beyond that, what's the long term prognosis for this brand?

Is the mainstreaming of a luxury brand really such a hot idea? Ever?

Don't niches exist for a reason (like, they're niches, not mainstream, for a reason)?

Aren't Cadbury just going to commoditise (cheapen) the G&B brand by association?

And where's the disclosure, anyway? Nothing on my bar of Maya Gold indicates to me (and all my consumer drivers) that anything has changed.

The addition of the Cadbury brand dilutes something about the G&B brand that mattered to me. Something I paid a premium for. And to be honest, something in me felt...healthier...for choosing it over its commodity cousin. Which is faintly ridiculous, but there you have it.

I've never really thought about it up until now, but choosing G&B is sort of an anti-Cadbury's decision for me. By voting Green and Blacks, I've been (consciously or not) rejecting the Cadburys' of the world. The same way I make (what is a more deliberate choice) when I choose Madras Cafe and Books over Borders or Whitcoulls.

Will I continue to buy this brand of chocolate?

Not sure, really. Call me a food snob, but I think the brand has lost a little something in my eyes.

I had never really thought about who owned it or where it came from before. I was surprised to find out just how big the brand was - even before it was taken over by the dark forces of corporatised chocolate.

It doesn't even make any sense to be considering change. But then when did consumer behaviour ever really make any sense?

Sure, I'll finish my bar of Maya Gold. The chocolate still tastes the same. I think. It's still all of the stuff it was meant to be. But something has changed for me.

And it's a salient reminder of just how great an influence the story of the brand has on our experience of the product.

Comments

[Angela Whitehead]

You've hit the nail on the head, with what irritates many consumers about The Body Shop these days. People chose to buy from them because they were animal friendly, earth friendly etc. But as the customers become more and more aware that global rapist L'Oreal (harsh words, but its TRUE!) now owns Body Shop, that feeling that you are doing something good disappears!

I can't even make myself buy their blackhead squeezing tools now, because I know that thier parent company still tests on animals, and the 'against animal testing' motto on thier signage is really less-than honest, with L'Oreal still testing thier own products on animals.

So I don't think you are even being faintly ridiculous about your chocolate. We support smaller businesses because they work harder to keep us happy. When the big businesses buy them out, standards slip. Theres always another little upstart company worthy of my $$$.