Today we’d like to introduce you to Kevin Drummey and Stephen Knoop.
Hi Kevin and Stephen, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
Our chocolate-making journey began in 2020 after discovering the ethics concerning most of the world’s chocolate and sugar production. Kevin ultimately pursued chocolate-making after seeing a call to action from Manoa Chocolate’s YouTube page. They called for people to enter the world of chocolate craft so that small, ethically produced cacao farms could survive. The more small craft chocolate makers there are, the more we can positively impact small-scale, ethically grown cacao producers around the world.
At the time we were in the midst of our Permaculture Design Course, which has been instrumental in developing our business and lives since then. We approach chocolate-making from the reality that we are a part of nature. We need to nurture and support the Earth as well as all of the communities impacted by the entire cycle of cacao cultivation, production, and distribution before we consider taking a bite of the truly special thing that is a chocolate bar.
From 2020 to 2022, our chocolate-making journey made the shift from hobby to business as we relocated from Los Angeles back to the East Coast to both be closer to family and pursue starting a chocolate-making business. We moved to the Greensboro area in the summer 2021 and officially started Eigen Chocolate in early 2022.
We’ve been slowly expanding and have joined some amazing communities here in the Triad. Our chocolates are produced on our property in our certified home kitchen, and we primarily sell at local farmers’ markets every Saturday morning. We are currently a part of two fabulous farmers markets: The Greensboro Corner Market and the Cobblestone Farmer’s Market in Winston-Salem.
In 2023, we’ve been able to increase our production and offer products at several retail locations including: Black Magnolia Southern Patisserie, Deep Roots Market Co-Op, Chez Genèse, 83 Custom Coffee, Company’s Coming, Sunset Market Gardens Millboro and Co.
We all face challenges, but looking back, would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
There have definitely been challenges. Learning how to display and sell items at a farmers’ market has been quite a journey. Being exposed to the elements for 4+ hours reminds you how used to being indoors we’ve become.
You don’t expect chocolate to melt on a 50-degree fall day, but if the sun shines in one place for long enough, it’ll get more than warm enough to ruin a few bars laid out on your table at market. There’s also the other elements to contend with, like wind and rain. We spend a long time putting our packaging together, and it only takes one raindrop to ruin a label or one good gust of wind to blow your entire farmer’s market display over – potentially into a puddle.
The chocolate-making process can be unforgiving in itself. Tempering chocolate is one of the more difficult aspects of the process. Despite being in a temperature-controlled environment, there are still seasonal differences that affect the timing of the tempering process that we’ve had to learn. The transition from making a dozen chocolate bars to making a few hundred at a time has had some growing pains. If you mess the tempering process up on 12 bars, it doesn’t hurt so bad as dumping 120 already poured bars back into the pan to re-melt so you can try tempering them again.
Great, so let’s talk business. Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
We are bean-to-bar chocolate makers applying the principals of Earth care, people care, and fair share as our foundation to transform your perception of chocolate. We passionately handcraft rich chocolates using ethically sourced cacao and sugar bought through transparent supply chains from distributors that maintain direct relationships with each producer they work with. These relationships ensure producers respect and value the biodiversity of their land, treat their workers with dignity, and provide a just standard of living through equitable wages. In an effort to reduce our own product’s impact we use compostable packaging for all of our chocolate bars.
As a small-batch chocolate maker, we control each step of the process to a greater degree than a large-batch chocolate maker can. This control gives us an opportunity to develop different flavors than you might find from a larger producer, even with the same beans. We frequently have customers remark on the fruit-forward flavor of many of our chocolates, and we have yet to try chocolate from another maker that tastes like ours.
So many chocolate bars available at the supermarket contain far too many ingredients. Our dark chocolates are just cacao and sugar, no added emulsifiers. All of our bars are gluten- or soy-free, and all of our dark chocolates are also vegan.
We also step outside of the realm of just dark and milk chocolate; we produce a number of innovative white chocolates. I can confidently say I don’t believe anyone else makes a ‘Milk Tea’ chocolate bar. It certainly isn’t for everyone, and it doesn’t taste like what you expect chocolate to taste like, but seeing people’s faces light up when they taste something pleasant they’ve never had before is such a treat. We’d also like to take this moment to say white chocolate is chocolate – so long as you’re only using cocoa butter to make it. Most people think they don’t like white chocolate because they’ve been accustomed to a strange concoction of palm and vegetable oils blended up with emulsifiers and low-quality skim milk powder. A proper white chocolate is worth trying. We offer a number of vegan, soy, and gluten-free white chocolates ranging from tropical fruits to tea-based bars.
Our labels often provide a starting point for customers to engage us with. Passers-by frequently comment on how much they enjoy the different patterns, colors, and creatures we have on our packaging. We try tell a story about each origin through our packaging. Each label has either an animal or botanical unique to the region the cacao is cultivated. That, combined with the colors and patterns used in the label sets the mood for what you might experience as you take your first bite.
What quality or characteristic do you feel is most important to your success?
Authentic passion. We really find chocolate, from the cultivating to the making process, seriously interesting. We get excited when we taste a new origin, and we love trying chocolate from other makers. We share that excitement and passion with our customers through our chocolates.
Pricing:
- Small, 25g, Chocolate Bars – $6
- Large, 50g, Chocolate Bars – $9
- Drinking Chocolate Tins – $15
- 8-Piece Bonbon Gift Set – $25
- Chocolate Tasting Collection Tin – $35
Contact Info:
- Website: www.eigenchocolate.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/eigenchocolate/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/eigenchocolate/
- Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/eigen-chocolate-greensboro
Image Credits
Tom Barbee
Stephen Knoop
