This is Zotter

It’s worth having a look!

Having a look at where your food originates from and knowing how it is has been produced increases the appreciation for the food as well as the enjoyment.

3 steps to obtain the z o t t e r chocolate

1st step

raw material fromLatin America, Austria and the rest ofthe world

2nd step

processing and invention in the z o t t e r chocolate factory

3rd step

design and artistic layout

The story of each bar of chocolate starts with the farmers. Here, in the cocoa forests of Latin America, thrives our raw cocoa which is processed into chocolate at our factory in Bergl. Cocoa is a classical type of cash crop. The farmers do not even know what is made out of it. Or rather, they do not even know any chocolate. For this reason we cooperate closely with the farmers. The farmers should see what is created out of their cocoa and why every step of processing is important.

We process raw cocoa from Panama – Costa Rica – Nicaragua – Peru – Bolivia – Ecuador – Brazil and the Dominican Republic. All our raw material suppliers are certified as ORGANIC and FAIR TRADE. That means our ethical sourcing won’t leave a bad taste in your mouth.

In particular: In cooperation with the Austrian Development Aid and the NGOs Horizont3000 as well as Initiative Eine Welt Braunau we have successfully started the project >Cocoa against Poverty< with 3 cocoa cooperatives from Nicaragua. Due to our multitude of varieties we have created a huge treasury of ingredients in Bergl. Among them you will find an astounding number of ingredients from Austria and from all over the world.

Our intention is to support ambitious small farmers who cultivate regional products with love. On the one hand this forms part of our philosophy, and on other hand these farmers ensure the best quality.

Together with our excellent team of about 100 employees we create the z o t t e r chocolates for you at our family establishment in Bergl near Riegersburg. Here we not only invent outstanding fillings and varieties for the hand-scooped chocolates, but also chocolate mass. Of course, chocolate bars have already existed for 150 years and chocolate for approx. 3,000 years, although the development still continues. We produce our chocolate bars bean-to-bar. This means that the bags of raw cocoa are directly delivered to us by rural cocoa cooperatives, are roasted, ground, conched and processed into bars. That’s the way we work in our factory. The purpose of this is to be able to process the raw cocoa individually. Raw cocoa from Nicaragua is processed in a different way to raw cocoa from Brazil, even though the final result is in both cases a milk chocolate. However, in this milk chocolate you  may still taste the cocoa of the region. At our company we do not apply any run-of-the-mill solutions. Because this standardisation of taste is simply dull. This kind of levelling definitely ranks among the drawbacks of globalisation. For this reason we rely on variety instead of milking cash cows.

The z o t t e r chocolate is marked by another particular feature: the design.
The creative artist Andreas h. Gratze, is in charge of this. He incorporated arts into our marketing. Gratze creates a new picturesque or humorous theme for each variety. He holds the view that advertising should not permanently underestimate the intelligence of its customers, but rather be exciting and demanding.