Are you planning to hand out chocolate this Halloween? Did you know that some well-known chocolate brands purchase their chocolate from farms that use child labor or don’t pay living wages? And some other brands choose to look the other way or don’t track their ingredient sourcing carefully.
Buying Fair Trade chocolate is a good way to support growers who are not using child or slave labor. Please look for the Fair Trade certification on the labels of chocolate (and coffee and tea) to support companies that source their ingredients from environmentally sustainable farms and compensate their growers fairly.
The UUCPA Action Council will not be selling Fair Trade chocolate this year, but you can buy your own to share for trick-or-treating. To make it easier, we have done some of the research for you.
You can look at the updated chocolate “score card,” which rates the parent companies of many chocolate brands on a host of issues such as traceability, child and forced labor, living wages, deforestation, and agricultural chemical management:
https://www.chocolatescorecard.com/scorecards/The scorecard contains a search function, which is helpful for finding the parent company of familiar brands. For instance, if you search for “Ghirardelli,” you’ll see that the parent company is “Lindt,” which has a mixed record on most issues.
Many large companies have improved their practices over prior years due to consumer attention and pressure, so your purchasing decisions matter. You can often find some highly rated brands at your local Costco, Safeway, World Market, and Target stores (and you will definitely find some of them at Whole Foods), though not all companies sell chocolate in packages that are convenient for Halloween. In addition, below are links to several online stores where you can order individually wrapped Fair Trade chocolates, along with the approximate price per piece (ignoring shipping and taxes, which may be waived depending on order size). Chocolate prices have been rising in recent years due to cacao shortages and tariffs, but the products below are some of the less expensive Fair Trade options we found that come in small portion sizes for Halloween:
Alter Eco (Halba): This top-rated company on this year’s chocolate score card has a unit price around $1 at their website, or $0.90 per piece if you provide your email address for a 10%-off coupon. Too expensive? Keep reading!
https://www.alterecofoods.com/collections/trufflesTony’s ChocoLonely: This is the second-highest rated company on this year’s chocolate score card! The unit price is $0.50 per piece directly from Tony’s website: https://us.tonyschocolonely.com/products/variety-pack-tiny-tonys-pouchThey can also be found at other online retailers like Target and Amazon for similar prices.Ritter Sport: This German company came in third on the chocolate score card. Its chocolates are available at several third-party websites. An affordable option for the mini size chocolates can be found for $0.60 per piece (before potential coupons). For your personal enjoyment, you can also find their full-size chocolates at Trader Joe’s, among other retailers.
https://millerandbean.com/products/ritter-sport-minis-chocolate-squares-variety-pack-84-17gEqual Exchange: This Fair Trade company sources their ingredients directly from worker co-ops. We sold these at UUCPA many years ago. Unit price is $0.31 per piece.
Ocho: Unit price is ranges from $0.52 to $0.69 per piece, depending on variety, with free shipping on orders over $59. In past years, we have seen these at our local Target store, sometimes with better pricing, so keep an eye out for them.https://www.ochocandy.com/collections/all?filter.p.product_type=Minis+-+variation&sort_by=title-ascending
Unreal: We found variety packs on sale at Target for $0.60 per piece, or you can find the dark chocolate minis at Costco Online (for members) for $0.45 to $0.62/piece:
https://www.costco.com/s?keyword=Unreal&refinement=brands%253DUnrealIf you’re lucky enough to hit a sale, we saw the Unreal dark chocolate coconut minis on sale in Costco stores for $0.38/piece last year
–better than the online price!
TCHO: Another well-known Fair Trade brand that sells 16-piece bags for $0.75 to $0.78 per piece at the Natural Candy Store.
You can find and browse other unique Fair Trade candy brands here too!
If you would like to browse several other Fair Trade Certified brands and products at one site, you can visit:https://www.fairtradecertified.org/blog/fair-trade-chocolate/However, most of these products come in larger portion sizes that are less convenient for Halloween, but suitable for indulging yourself.Of course, you can always give out something other than candy! However, if you choose to give chocolate or buy some for your own enjoyment, the Action Council urges you to purchase Fair Trade chocolate to support fair wages and avoid rewarding the abusive labor practices which are still common in the industry.
Thank you,Action Council members
Kristi Iverson (Chair), Sally Ahnger, Chris Cassell, Sean Hansen, Chris Jacobi, Edie Keating, Robert Neff, and Karen Skold