Canisters for chocolate impart good taste: foil labels on spiral-wound canisters translate to upscale packaging for a luxury chocolatier

Food & Drug Packaging, April, 2002

IN A NUTSHELL

Goal: Market premium baking chocolate and cocoa in attractive, "upscale" packaging

How: Use composite canisters with litho-printed foil labels

Results: Domestically converted canisters look as good as tins from overseas

When you sell products through Martha Stewart' your packaging can't look like something you'd see at a dollar store.

That's what went through the mind of executives at Christopher Norman Chocolates Ltd. as they considered how to package two new products: chocolate chunks and cocoa powder.

Christopher Norman is one of the premier U.S. marketers of super-premium chocolate. It markets luxury candy and cooking items through mail-order venues like Martha Stewart's Web page and catalog, specialty confectioners and upscale department stores like Neiman Marcus and Saks Filth Avenue. Its newest products include two items for gourmet baking: Special Edition Chunks, in milk, white and semi-sweet chocolate; and Special Edition Cocoa Powder.

For these products, Christopher Norman partners with Schokinag Chocolate, a German manufacturer that produces mostly for industrial ingredients and foodservice. Schokinag ships cocoa and chocolate in bulk to a contract packager, Immaculate Baking Co. in Hendersonville, N.C. The 1-pound packages of baking chunks and the 12-ounce packages of cocoa powder bear both the Christopher Norman and Schokinag names.

These products, both with a suggested retail price of $12.95, need upscale packaging to carry off their premium cachet. Price wasn't a consideration, at least to the degree that it would be for a mass-market product.

Metal tins would be the most common choice, says Christopher Norman's John Down, who bears the title "chief chocolate officer" as well as the more prosaic "vice president for design and visual presentation." The problem is that Christopher Norman couldn't find a domestically produced metal tin that came up to its standards.

"If you want a really nice tin you have to go to England or Japan or Germany" Down says. "The printing techniques on tins here are not the best."

The company ended up using paperboard canisters from Sonoco. The baking chunks are packaged in a 401 x 600, 1-pound composite canister, and the cocoa comes in a 302 x 708, 12-ounce canister. The cans are spiral-wound of 100% recycled paperboard, giving them the strength needed for shipping.

Both canisters feature litho-printed convolute foil labels in gold, platinum, moss green and red, with subtle horizontal stripes and understated graphics further enhancing the elegant image of the product. Offset lithography printing, with metallic ink on a foil laminate, gives the label a pleasing gloss and texture. "If you did that on straight board or paper, you'd get the flat, dull look of metallic, but not the real feel of it," Down says.

The baking chunk cans feature a seamed-on metal end and a slip-cover metal lid, while the cocoa powder has a black plastic base and a black plastic and cream roto-top for convenient shaking and pouring. The cocoa powder canisters are lined with foil to prevent clumping, while the baking chunks are packaged in an interior heat-sealed foil "flow pack."

"Although we are spending a lot on our packaging, it's a good value because it makes a statement about who we are and the quality of our chocolate," Down says.

Immaculate Baking Co.
828-696-1655;
www.immaculateconsumption.com

Sonoco
(843)383-7000; www.sonoco.com