Analysis and Studies - Products analysis
Chocolate eggs history and main trends of cocoa and cocoa preparation industry
April 14th 2022
Eggs started as a pagan symbol of fertility and spring, in Italy, since the Middle Ages, people would give eggs as gifts at Easter. In fact, eggs symbolize rebirth, but they also have a relation with Jesus Christ. At first glance, the eggs look empty and lifeless, just like the stone that was blocking Jesus’ sepulcher. But, inside the egg, there is life ready to flourish, like the sepulcher in which Christ’s body was kept. That is how the egg became a symbol of resurrection.
Chocolate eggs first appeared at the court of Lous XIV in Versailles but the result wasn’t good and success poor. In Turin (Italy) in 1725 the widow Giambone started producing chocolate eggs by filling empty chicken eggshells with molten chocolate. In 1873 J.S. Fry & Sons of England introduced the first chocolate Easter egg in Britain. Manufacturing their first Easter egg in 1875, Cadbury created the modern chocolate Easter egg after developing a pure cocoa butter that could be molded into smooth shapes. Further improvements in producing chocolate eggs were done around 1920 in Turin and people wanted to give the chocolate egg a more festive connotation. So, in 1925, they decided to put a small surprise inside the chocolate egg. Originally, the eggs were filled with small animals made with sugar paste, or some sugared almonds, then, they started putting small objects.
In Western cultures, the giving of chocolate eggs is now commonplace with also chocolate bunnies more popular in Northern Europe.
In the US, Easter is the second best-selling candy holiday after Halloween with chocolate eggs as the most popular sweet, as well as in the UK with around 80 million sold chocolate eggs.
And what about the chocolate industry?
Considering cocoa and cocoa preparation industry:
- top exporters are German, Cote d'Ivoire, Netherlands, Belgium, and Italy
- top importers are the United States, Netherlands, Germany, France, and United Kingdom
Cocoa and cocoa preparations were the world's 53rd most traded product.