The Dreaded C Word:

Why Christmas in July Isn’t Just for Movie Channels

Mention Christmas in the summer and you'll probably get one of two reactions. Some people love it and are happily planning gifts and counting sleeps. Others groan and say, ‘what? Already?’.

We've all become used to seeing festive films appearing on TV, shops tempting us with early offers and some freakishly organised people starting their gift shopping in the January sales. But for many small businesses, Christmas planning isn't a novelty or a marketing gimmick - it's simply how the business works.

Before The Chocolate Begins…

For an artisan chocolatier, the festive season doesn't begin when the first Christmas order arrives. By then, months of planning, ordering and decision making have already happened behind the scenes. By the time customers are browsing my website for festive gifts, I’m probably thinking about next Easter. Ok, maybe it’s not that bad but I’m definitely well past the excited stage!

I’m writing this in July and I’ve already re-ordered my bespoke packaging to avoid long lead times when my supplier gets swamped with Christmas orders later in the year. I’ve purchased a supply of ballotin boxes for the many, many batches of fondant creams I know I’ll be making, along with postal ‘outers’ to dispatch orders in.

I’ve also bought new Christmas themed packaging and chocolate moulds before they sell out, I’ve booked events, and thought about what products will be returning and which new ideas might make the cut.

There’s also the less glamorous side of planning: looking at what worked last year, what could improve sales, what could be changed or streamlined and how I can make production less physically demanding.

Lots of this stuff gets scribbled in….. my notebook (cue dramatic music).

The Notebook

Ideas don't arrive on a schedule. They appear while I'm washing bowls, driving home from an event or halfway through making truffles - or annoyingly in the middle of the night when I can’t sleep.

My notebook is full of flavour ideas, new product concepts, blog topics, pricing calculations, random brainwaves and reminders that only make sense to me (if I’m lucky).

The problem isn’t writing them down. It's remembering I wrote them four months later when I actually need them!

But perhaps the trickiest part is deciding which ideas make it into the final range. Because, sadly, I don’t actually have a crystal ball. I can use experience, customer feedback and my best judgement but I can never be completely certain what customers will love…. or what will leave them cold.

Sometimes the products I expect to be the most popular aren't the ones that take off, and the ones I think might appeal to a smaller audience surprise me.

Last year, my Winter Spirits collection was a perfect example. I created it because I liked the idea of combining warming winter flavours with a little festive booziness, but I honestly expected it to be a fairly niche collection. Instead, it turned out to be one of my most popular boxes and far exceeded my expectations.

In contrast, Advent calendars are ridiculously unpredictable. Some years they fly out, and other years I find myself wondering whether I have accidentally created a festive chocolate mountain that will still be staring at me in January. (Blast! I’ll just have to eat them myself!)

It turns out that even the best planning can't predict everything. As Taylor Swift once said - “Just because you made a good plan, doesn’t mean that’s what’s gonna happen.”

But Will It Work?

Of course, the inspiration for a product is only the beginning. A great idea still has to pass the practical tests.

Will it be too labour-intensive to make at a price customers are willing to pay? Is it too fragile to survive the post or the journey to an event? Can I find suitable packaging that protects it and makes it look as special as it deserves?

Many's the time I've fallen in love with a quirky chocolate mould, only to discover that finding a box to fit it is impossible. I've gone ahead with some products and packaged them in pretty bags instead, but sometimes they just don't have the same impact. A beautifully designed box can be part of the experience - it makes a product feel like a special gift rather than just a piece of chocolate.

My chocolate Buddhas and Cameos are a classic example. I love the moulds and the chocolates themselves, but finding packaging that shows them off properly remains a challenge.

And all of these decisions involve spending money before you know if they'll work.

I’ve Spent How Much?!

The other regular feature of summer is the dwindling bank account.

Chocolate sales slow when the weather gets hot. Understandably, when it's 30°C outside, many people would rather think about ice cream than truffles. This year has been especially challenging.

But while income slows, the spending certainly doesn't.

Moulds, packaging and long shelf-life ingredients all have to be ordered and paid for months in advance, along with event pitch fees. The money goes out long before the Christmas sales come in.

While most people are enjoying their holidays, I’m looking at the bank balance and quietly praying to the chocolate gods that this Christmas will be a good one.

People often assume handmade chocolate must have huge profit margins because it's a luxury product. And while it's true that some brands can command very high-end prices, the reality for small artisan businesses like mine is rather different.

By the time I've paid for Belgian chocolate, fresh ingredients, packaging, labels, electricity, transaction fees and everything else involved in producing each box, I have to sell a lot of chocolate to earn what someone selling a single piece of jewellery might make from one sale.

That's simply the reality of making artisan food.

Creating Chaos From Order

Along with all the planning goes organisation.

Chocolate moulds and packaging live in lidded crates and boxes on industrial shelving in the garage. Ribbons, decorative cellophane bags and other sundries are in stacking draw units. Ingredients labels in files. Everything has it’s place. In theory.

To be fair, it is like that most of the time but, by

sometime around the middle of December when I’m ready to close for business, my carefully organised storage system has usually descended into what I’ll generously call 'organised chaos'.

In the final push to get all orders out in time, the dining room looks like an abstract art installation. It’s my packing station and is now strewn with an assortment of packaging, ribbons, tape, bags, sheets of labels etc.

When it’s all done, reels of ribbon, unused bags, leftover boxes, old Uncle Tom Cobley and all get swept into a box and carried down to the garage so the house can feel like a home again. The event paraphernalia - tables, display shelves, tinsel, the fairy lights that have somehow become tangled around everything - is unloaded from the boot of my car and also dumped in the garage.

Every year I promise myself I'll sort it all out properly.

Every January I'm still recovering from Christmas and somehow never quite get round to it.

Which means that, come time to start making again, one of the first questions I ask myself is:

"Now... where did I put that mould I bought three months ago?"

Behind Every Truffle

So if you ever wonder why an artisan chocolatier is talking about Christmas while everyone else is enjoying summer, this is why.

Long before the first festive order is placed, months of planning and preparation have already been going on behind the scenes. (Including hunting for missing chocolate moulds.)

By the time you unwrap a beautifully presented box of handmade chocolates in December, you're seeing the end of a journey that started months earlier.

And, despite the planning, the illegible notes, the organised chaos and the occasional prayer to the chocolate gods, I wouldn't have it any other way.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a garage to tidy up.