Queen Anne Chocolates fighting the recession this Easter

Easter came early this year, with chocolates hitting the shelves and immediately hitting the baskets of customers. One company that has already sold all their Easter stock is Queen Anne Chocolates.

Queen Anne is a smaller sized chocolate producer when compared to major companies like Cadbury and Lindt. They are still able to hold their own with a huge growth happening for the company last year. At the beginning of last year their sales were at 652,000 individual items sold and at the beginning of this year their sales had reached 802,000 individual items sold.

Managing Director of Queen Anne Chocolates, Sarah Adams, is happy with how the Easter season has gone for the company. While it has been stressful with it being a shorter season, with Easter being earlier in the year, the company’s sales are up which Sarah says is due to the brand.

With the announcement that New Zealand is in a recession, many smaller businesses are worried about whether their business will survive or not. Sarah said that while it was tough for Queen Anne and would be into the future, chocolates were pretty much recession-proof as people are always going to want chocolate.

Metro News was unable to get a comment from Foodstuffs South Island but was able to get an interview with a Pak’nsave employee who wanted to remain anonymous. They’ve seen a large number of Easter-themed chocolates coming into the store and then leaving quite quickly.

Queen Anne is celebrating its 99^th birthday this year and plans to release more chocolates and specialty items to celebrate 100 hundred years of Queen Anne next year. While there was the fear of the recession affecting them and their chocolate business, Easter has been good for them, and the future is also looking good.