Dan's Chocolate - Social Responsibility

Dan's Chocolate Cares

Our chocolate is solely supplied by chocolate makers who belong to the World Cocoa Foundation, which is a group that works in Central America to teach sustainable cocoa farming and raise farmers' incomes. The WCF has its own people on site and is committed to a long term approach. Due to this, it has been effective in raising the standard of living of farmers with whom they work. To learn more visit worldcocoafoundation.org.

A primary reason this site was established was to support local artists and photographers. Our founder, Dan Cunningham, is an amateur photographer and likes to draw. We are hoping we can help support people in the creative professions, and make connections between local buyers and local creative people.

Dan's Chocolates has worked hard to develop boxed chocolates that are both unique and affordable, and at the same time establish a business that respects the planet on which we live. With that objective, we have implemented many energy and materials reduction policies. These programs will only be improved in the future. We have:

Reduced our cardboard packaging on our external shipping cartons by 35% by changing the design shape.
Moved our shipping operations next to our factory to reduce fuel and overhead in trucking (50% reduction in fuel and trucking achieved).
Changed packaging suppliers to be near our factory, to reduce fuel and overhead in transportation.
Moved our chocolate sources to a larger share of U.S. gourmet producers to reduce fuel and transportation overhead. This has created more U.S. jobs as well.
Initiated service with Fedex Ground in addition to Fedex Express. Ground shipments consume less energy.
Implemented a "no paper office" internally, where we have reduced our office paper and supplies use by 90% by doing everything we can digitally. (The last 10%, we admit, is very hard to achieve!)
Installed computer monitor sleep software, fluorescent bulbs, and timed thermostats in our offices to cut down on electricity usage.
Over 50% of office and sales employees now work from home to reduce transportation fuel.
We are looking at replacing inefficient motors in our production machines to save energy.
We are currently looking into methods to buy or produce wind energy or potentially add thin-film solar to our factory rooftop.

Unlike most of our major competitors, Dan's Chocolates is an independent chocolate maker, and is not a subsidiary or division of a major corporation. We intend to keep it this way, as this gives us the flexibility to invest in long term projects that are in line with our mission.