In a just published poll, the Portland Press Herald reports that about 80% of the Mainers surveyed agree that prices have gone up in the last year, and 70% think they will continue to climb.

As chocolatiers, we are dealing with a much more extreme price increase:  the root cause being three very bad harvests in the countries that grow a huge portion of the world chocolate, the Ivory Coast and Ghana. 

As a result, we are facing a 45% increase in the cost of our next big delivery, just for the chocolate.  In addition, we will need to tack another 7% to the new prices to cover the recently enacted tariffs.  

Tariffs imposed on China have also impacted us:  while 90% of the boxes we sell come from Augusta, Maine (made by JS McCarthy & sons),  large rigid boxes are no longer produced in this country.  These include our 25, 32 and 64 chocolate boxes, which are custom crafted for us by an excellent manufacturer in China.  Because our chocolates are purchased as gifts, the boxes have to be beautiful.  And so we have to pay the tariffs.

What is the bottom line?  We are increasing our prices an average of 7% effective September 1 through the holidays.  In January, we will need to enact another progressive increase, which we will determine once we have made our big chocolate purchases for 2026.  

To offset the pain, we will make sure our upcoming chocolate collections will be even more worthy of your outlay!  And we thank you for loyally supporting our little business, in spite of the very challenging times.

Catherine and Sarah, Co-Owners