Sweet Success

It’s hard work coming up with all those soft centres when you’re a chocolatier.

Dreaming up new flavours such as ‘white chocolate truffle with Manuka honey and vodka, coated in raspberry’ is the fun part of a chocolatier’s work.

The difficulties in selling delicate gourmet chocolates begin with packaging, marketing and distribution, planning new specialty lines for Easter and Christmas and competing against the big brands, to name only a few of the challenges.

So how has boutique chocolate producer, Stephanie Everitt managed all this successfully for 11 years?

Her Magazine caught up with the chocolatier, who named her family business after the sunny seaside village in Auckland where she proudly hand crafts gourmet chocolates of the highest standard for customers to enjoy.

Devonport Chocolates are produced in very small batches – often to order – and only the finest ingredients are used to ensure everything is the freshest it can be. Good quality chocolate can be a very satisfying taste sensation and with flavours such as Cappuccino Crunch, Hazelnut and Strawberry, or Chilli and Lime, it is almost impossible to resist the temptations of Devonport Chocolates. You can find them at gift shops from Invercargill to Matakana, follow them on Facebook, or visit the Devonport Chocolate shops in Auckland.

There you can choose from a range of single origin, organic and Gourmet Fair Trade chocolates, handmade truffles, specialty chocolate logs and hot espresso-sized shots of dark chocolate mixed with cream and milk; a great way to get your chocolate fix on a cold day!
Stephanie and her team also create corporate gifts and specialise in conference chocolates, promotional and personalised chocolates.

As homage to the thousands of tourists who visit the Devonport shop and factory, Stephanie also decided to design a gift range of chocolate souvenirs. Local artist, Fraser Williams drew the unique Kiwiana illustrations for the chocolate tablet wraps, which capture the essence of New Zealand.

Stephanie explains how she comes up with new ideas for her chocolates, such as ‘white chocolate truffle with Manuka honey and vodka, coated in raspberry’.

“There is always a starting point to a new flavour or concept. In this case, it was an idea for producing a collection of chocolates using the great honey that is available in New Zealand. We had made honey and lavender chocolates for some years but we wanted to build that flavour into a range using some distinctive New Zealand flavours as well as the more classical lavender. We sourced kawakawa, horopito and harakeke flakes and tried them with the two honeys we were trialling – bush flower and manuka. The kawakawa and horopito were an interesting balance with the honey.

“We also tried raspberry and vodka, feijoa and passionfruit.

“Then we did the costing and that narrowed the choices further. We settled on bush flower honey and more samples were made with a few extras added in such as horopito and lemon and horopito and black pepper. A tasting took place with our tasting panel and the selection was narrowed down to four flavours: raspberry, horopito and lemon, kawakawa and lavender.
“We launched the range at the Fine Food Fair in June this year and we have received great feedback from customers. They enjoy trying something new and they find the two New Zealand flavours interesting.”

How did the family business survive 11 challenging years?

“We purchased Devonport Chocolates in 1999. I had known of the business for several years and knew that it might be for sale. Meanwhile my husband, Terry and I decided to spend six months travelling in Europe and after that I was going to do my English Second Language Teaching Certificate.

“The first day of my new life began when the previous owners of Devonport Chocolates rang to say the business was for sale. Our break to Europe was shortened and I still haven’t done the English Second Language certificate.

“We have focused on building a brand, understanding what the brand stands for and being true to our customers. In chocolate terms, this means New Zealand handmade chocolate and quality, quality, quality.

“We have settled on three taglines that we use:

• Devonport Chocolates world of pleasure
• Pure Pleasure
• For the love of fine chocolate.

“Everything we do must underpin the taglines.

“My husband Terry joined the business in 2002. He looks after our finances and is chief engineer for the machinery we use. My daughter Caroline worked for us while she was at university completing her communications degree and she now oversees the two shops, the website and Facebook.

“Our son David manages the Google Adwords part of our marketing strategy from London where he is based.

“We wouldn’t have survived without great staff who are loyal, reliable and take every opportunity to improve their skills.”

Facebook or Food Show? How do you decide on marketing strategies?

“We now have a retail division to the business and a wholesale division. They usually need different marketing strategies.

We also have a limited marketing budget and our strategy is to meet our market. This means that Facebook is mainly a retail customer communication strategy and The Fine Food Fair is predominantly a wholesale communication strategy where we meet our hospitality, corporate and reseller clients and also prospective new clients.”

Best business advice

“Plan, focus and keep in touch with your customers.

“This is what we try to do, but I find I can be easily diverted and need to pull myself back into the plan instead of heading off to a new idea or concept every five minutes.

“I enjoy contacting and visiting our customers. Each one of them has supported us through the good and tougher times and they are what makes it all worthwhile. Chocolate is fun but the feedback from customers, whether retail or wholesale, is what makes the long hours a pleasure.

“Also, we were given advice by a Swiss chocolatier whose family had been making chocolate for six generations. He said to keep a tight range of chocolate flavours, too much choice confuses everyone and it is hard for them to make a decision. I can support that.”

Woman you admire most

“I admire EVERY woman.

“The women who hold down a job, bring up a family, look after their home, maybe have a partner and still manage to balance it all, allowing time for their interests and passions. I don’t know how they do it. It has been a constant challenge for me and I take my hat off to anyone who has achieved such a challenge. I believe the expectations on young women these days are much higher than they were a generation ago. I am lucky to have such a supportive husband who has encouraged me in everything I undertake and always told me that I can do it.”

Favourite saying

“I saw this on the wall of a school staffroom about 1985 and have taken it to heart. It goes something like this …

Some people make things happen.
Some people watch what happens.
Some people wonder what happens.”

Guilty pleasure

“Chocolate, chocolate … and cheese”

Best life balance tip

“Be mindful of life balance always and take time to smell the roses. It is so easy to be overtaken with a busy patch as we are at Christmas and Easter and have all balance go out the window for months. In these times I try to walk to work at least somedays and take time in the garden each week. It seems to ground me and I sleep better.”

Celebrate

“Every success no matter how small it seems. Every year we take time to look back over what we have achieved and the small successes add up.”

What’s next?

“We will stick to our knitting until the recession is over and meanwhile develop some new products. We would like to develop some export markets and open some more chocolate shops.”

If you had the chance to meet the original Willy Wonka, what would you ask him?

“Could you come to New Zealand and help me design a chocolate that has a sea aroma on a warm summer’s day?”