Imagine a world without chocolate | Jean Thompson | TEDxBellevueWomen

Jean is a fierce advocate for the chocolate ecosystem and is always thinking about being innovative in an industry that has been around for centuries.

In this talk, Jean educates us on the global economics of what it takes to produce that delicious nibble of chocolate. She will also share her vision of a chocolate renaissance, in the not-so-distant future.

Jean Thompson is the owner and CEO of Seattle Chocolate Company. She is a self-proclaimed chocoholic and brings an amazing amount of enthusiasm and excitement to running the company. She is always thinking about being innovative and disruptive in an industry that has been around for centuries. Jean’s mission is to help people see chocolate in a different way and imagines a world where chocolate is celebrated and valued for its complexity.

This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at https://www.ted.com/tedx

My love of chocolate started early.

Some of my earliest memories
from childhood were around chocolate.

I remember sneaking into the cupboard

and grabbing a handful
of semisweet chocolate morsels

and rummaging through the cupboard

to find where my mother
had hidden her stash of chocolate bars.

Since then, I think it is safe to say

that I've eaten chocolate
every single day.

(Laughter)

I can't imagine a world without chocolate.

But it's exactly the future
that we're facing.

Through college, studying psychology,

my first sales job,

and a marketing career at Microsoft,

I relied on my daily fix of chocolate.

I had no idea at the time

that it was going to be
such a central theme in my life.

Over 20 years ago,

I invested in a small,
regional chocolate company

called Seattle Chocolate
because I loved the product.

And in 2001,

an earthquake shook the Seattle area.

It was called the Nisqually earthquake.

And there were exactly two buildings
damaged during that earthquake:

the building Seattle Chocolate
was renting, without earthquake insurance,

and directly across the street,
Starbucks headquarters,

but only a small section of which
Seattle Chocolate was renting space in.

Our building was condemned when the walls
rattled away from the ceiling.

Somebody was going to have to step up

to move the operation

or the company was going
to go out of business.

So I did.

And at that point, I became the owner.

The following year, when my youngest
went off to kindergarten,

I decided to step in and help
the still struggling company

with its marketing, part time.

Within six weeks of joining the company,

the CEO quit and left me
holding the bag

and wondering if I should have kept
some of my opinions to myself.

(Laughter)

And I had no idea what I was going to do.

Should I let the company
go out of business?

I thought, there were 30 families
already relying on this company

for their livelihood.

And I thought to myself,

it's chocolate, how hard
can it be? Ha ha.

So I decided to step in and take over
the day-to-day operation.

And thus began my transformation
to business person, entrepreneur, and CEO.

Of course, I had no plan
to turn this company around,

so I just took one day
and one problem at a time.

I went with gut instinct.

I picked my employees' brains.

I went and visited the chocolate aisle
in the grocery store.

I read business books.

And I read every article
I could find on chocolate.

And things slowly started to improve.

I had a huge, steep learning curve.

I had to learn about manufacturing,
warehousing, the distribution channel,

finance,

how to build a brand,
and how to develop a corporate culture.

And that was the fun part.

And of course, I had to really love it
to endure the lows,

while raising two kids.

I had an ulcer, a panic attack,
a trip to the ER.

And it took me nearly 10 years
to turn that company around.

But, I'm still here, 17 years later,
and things are better.

I'd like to unpack chocolate
with you today.

But first I have a question for you.

How much money
would you be willing to spend

on a bottle of wine
that you share with a friend?

Fifteen dollars?

Pretty sure. Yeah.

Now, how much money
would you be willing to spend

on an artisan bar of chocolate
that you share with that same friend?

Three dollars?

Five?

Maybe not 15?

Well, I'm hoping by the end
of our time here together

that you'll consider spending as much
money on an artisan bar of chocolate,

as you would on that bottle of wine.

Because I'm afraid if you don't,
we may not have chocolate in the future.

In ancient times, four millennia ago,

the Mayans understood
the value of chocolate.

Of course, it wasn't chocolate back then,
it was just the cacao bean,

which they used as their currency.

I mean, it's money.

And the elite in their society took
the bean and turned it into a drink

that they believed to be an aphrodisiac

and a strength enhancing beverage

that they would consume
before heading into battle.

Somehow the ancients understood
that chocolate was special.

Today, chocolate is the inexpensive
darling of the candy aisle.

But I believe that we're in the throes
of a chocolate renaissance,

where people are starting to understand

chocolate is complex and sophisticated
and even nutritious.

Chocolate comes from
the Theobrama cacao tree,

a plant indigenous to Central
and South American rainforests.

These trees pop up
along the side of the road there.

Or they're planted in groves on farms.

They are typically very small farms,
three to five acres each,

family owned, and passed down
from generation to generation.

And there's over five million
of those farms in the world.

But every single one of them
is within 20 degrees of the equator

because that's where the rainforests are.

In the early colonial days,

the Europeans figured out
how to turn that bean into chocolate.

So they took the plants from the Americas

and brought them
to their colonies in Africa.

Today, 70 percent of the world's cacao

comes from two West African nations
of Ivory Coast and Ghana.

And 75 percent of the people
in the Ivory Coast

rely on chocolate,
or cacao, for their livelihood.

And with today's chocolate prices,

we ensure that they
will remain poor forever.

And every country, almost, every country
in that belt along the equator

does not have political power
or economic advantage.

The Theobroma cacao tree
is a strange looking tree

with football-shaped pods
that grow directly out of the trunk.

The farmers use long-handled machetes
to cut those pods down

and then right there on the farm
they cut the pods open,

which reveals a sticky, white, very acidic
and quite delicious pulp

that contains the beans.

As soon as they open the pod,
a fermentation process starts

and they load the sticky beans
into fermentation boxes,

where it ferments for almost a week
while they stir it and expose it to air.

How many of you knew that chocolate
was a fermented product?

From there, they load the beans
onto a long drying bed,

where it dries and basks
in the sun for another week.

Finally, the beans
are ready to go to market.

But, of course,
these farms are really remote.

They're in the middle of the jungle.

There's often not a road,

or if there is one,
it's in really bad shape.

And it wouldn't matter anyway

because most of these farmers can't afford
a vehicle, so there's no cars or trucks.

So what they do is they load
these beans in burlap sacks

and put them on wheelbarrows,
where they push the wheelbarrow for hours

through a muddy, rutty road of whatever
it is, till they can finally get paid.

Each pod contains 20 to 40
almond-shaped beans,

and it takes an entire pod
to make one chocolate bar.

and the tree only has 20 or 30
of those pods per year,

which is roughly three pounds
of chocolate a year.

Now, compare that to the way we consume
chocolate on the other side of the world.

Americans consume nine-and-a-half pounds
of chocolate per person per year.

That's 327 million of us.

And we don't even come close
to first place in this category.

The Swiss do with nearly 20 pounds
of chocolate per person per year.

God love 'em.

(Laughter)

As the population of our chocolate-loving
world continues to explode,

this demand is going to quickly outpace
the number of farmers

who are willing to work
for next to nothing.

In it's natural state the cacao bean
has a strong, bitter flavor.

Without sugar, it's a bit
of an acquired taste,

but it's darn near the perfect food.

It has heart-healthy fat,

a stimulant similar to caffeine
called theobromine.

It has protein, magnesium, fiber,

and is the food that is the highest
in antioxidants, by a long a shot,

by 50 percent,

to the next closest one, pecans.

So next time you want to add
some antioxidants to your diet,

reach for a one-ounce dark chocolate bar,

or you can continue to munch
on two and a thirds cup of kale.

(Laughter)

If you source beans from different plants
and different regions of the world

and process everything else
exactly the same,

they're going to taste wildly different.

So no surprise, the next part
of the process,

the chocolate-making process,

is equally difficult.

So the makers, who are largely
in the developed world,

take the beans and sort them,
and then they roast them,

and then they remove the shells
to reveal the nib,

and then they take the nib

and they press it
into a paste that's called liquor,

and then they take that liquor
and further refine it

so it's not gritty -
nobody wants gritty chocolate -

and then they slowly cook it,
for maybe days,

to get off the really
harsh volatile, strong flavors.

That's when they add the sugar
and the milk or whatever ingredients.

It's really hard to make chocolate.

But it's even harder
to make good chocolate.

And that, I believe, is two-thirds science

and one third art, finesse, and patience.

I have a chocolate tasting wheel
that helps you identify

because once they've made a delicious
chocolate, it's an unusual flavor profile.

It's layered, and you put it in your mouth

and it's kind of hard
to describe the experience.

Now, I've seen a similar wheel in wine,
when you're doing wine tastings.

Different adjectives.

But the point is, that both products
are equally complex

and equally interesting and fun to taste.

Cacao has, like all crops,
many natural and man-made enemies.

There's disease and drought,
made worse by climate change.

There's political strife and corruption
in a lot of these countries,

and there's desperation and poverty.

Sometimes the farmers
will cut down the rainforest

to plant additional cacao trees

in the hopes of earning
a few more dollars.

Of course the cacao tree is a rainforest,
it wants to be in that canopy,

and of course we all know
that's not good for our planet,

but they need whatever dollars
they can eek out.

The farmers are not making enough money
to have a decent living,

and their children see that -
they see how hard they're working,

and they're thinking, "I don't want
to do that when I grow up."

So there's a real crisis at origin.

The average farmer age
right now is in the fifties.

And they're not sure who's going
to take over the farming of their land

in the next generation, and guess what.

We don't have farmers, we don't have
the crop, we don't have chocolate.

Today's situation is bleak
and complicated.

The farmers are far away
and they have no voice.

And guess what.

They don't have a backup plan
where they can supplement their income

by working in a retail store;
they're in the middle of the jungle.

So they continue to do
what they've done for generations

and just hope that things will change.

Sometimes the farmers are forced
to use children, child labor,

to farm during the harvest
because they can't afford to pay anybody.

And when the harvest is done,
they don't want these beans to rot,

they need every bean.

And we don't like that in the industry
any more than you do,

but it's a very complicated
problem to solve

because these farms, over 5 million
of them, are all over the countryside.

There isn't a centralized way
to communicate with them

or get the message across,

so the situation continues.

There are certifying agencies
like Fair Trade,

Rainforest Alliance certification,
that are on the ground a little more often

trying to teach the farmers best practices

and encourage them
by paying them a little bit more

to, you know, send
their children to school.

It's helpful, but it's not really enough
for wholesale change.

I know people who are boycotting chocolate
right now because of this.

And I think,

"You're not helping the situation,

because all you're doing

is depriving the farmers
of their livelihood altogether."

And at the end of the day I believe
it's the low prices on chocolate

and this artificially low ceiling
and low perceived value of chocolate.

We think of it as a candy at Halloween
and Easter that kids should eat,

and it's cheap, right?

But it's not; it can be
an amazing delicacy.

But the chocolate makers
are pinched by the situation

because if you can't charge enough
for the chocolate,

then you can't afford to pay more
for the chocolate.

And here we stay in this catch-22.

I believe if you pay the farmers more,
pay the chocolate makers more,

then the children will go to school.

I envision a world where
there's a chocolate course at dinner,

maybe even a special plate.

And I see you sitting around and analyzing
and tasting and appreciating the terroir

or the percent cacao,

or the flavor notes, the subtle flavors.

And knowing how far away
the product really grew.

I think you're going to know some day

that cacao from Venezuela
tastes of red fruit and spice.

And cacao from Papua New Guinea
tastes earthy and citrusy.

And you're going to want to pay more
so that the farmer and the maker

and everyone along the food chain
takes the necessary time

to deliver the flavor note in that bean
and that delicacy to our table.

As an industry, what are we doing?

Well, I opened my factory
at Seattle Chocolate to tours

because I want to bring people in
and educate them

because I believe that's the first step:

understanding the stuff
that we're learning today.

There's a fine chocolate
industry association

that gets together several times a year

to brainstorm solutions
to our troubled supply chain.

There's an heirloom cacao foundation

that discovers new varietals of cacao
every year in faraway jungles

and tries to preserve them for our future.

There's universities all over the world
that are studying the genetics of cacao,

maybe labeling them some day
like Merlot or Cabernet;

we don't have that
in the world of chocolate,

but we have just as many
interesting varietals.

We need that.

So there's a movement happening
all around us, and that's a good thing.

But there's one
very critical thing missing,

and that's you.

We'll help join
and accelerate the renaissance.

Buy a 10 dollar artisan chocolate bar,
share it with a friend,

analyze it, find out what
the farmer's doing,

where are they located,
what do you like about it?

Then buy another, different one
and compare and contrast them

because no two 72 percent
chocolate bars taste the same.

They were fermented differently,
they came from different varietals,

they were roasted differently,

and it really results
in a different product every time.

It's fascinating.

And guess what. It's fun.

Bring a 40 dollar box of chocolate
to your next dinner party,

providing dessert and conversation.

It's going to take newfound and widespread

respect, understanding,
and appreciation of chocolate

to elevate cacao and give its farmers
the sustainable and prosperous future

that they deserve.

Thank you.

(Applause)