VALRHONA

I do not have a sweet tooth and do not usually get excited with chocolates as some do. I do, however, know the Valrhona name as one of the leading brands in that space. It was therefore a joy to visit the Head Office of this famous chocolatier. Located on a small section of an unassuming street off the town center of Hermitage, one just does not feel its corporate identity. One has to look quite hard, in fact, for the logo which is rather strange given its global brand image. What dominated the neighborhood is in fact the retail shop next to the HQ, a booming traffic of tourists with bags after bags of sweet-nothings dangling from their hands. I certainly have never seen a shop this size that only sells chocolates and paraphernalia ... what an eye opener. At the back of a multi-lingual cashier queue it took me a good 10 minutes to pay. These are marketing folks and they play the consumer psychology game well. In addition to freebies of trinkets at the counter there is a tasting tray in front of almost every item on sale, which reminds me of the food outlets at the basement of Tokyo department stores where one can make a meal out of free trials. All you can eat chocolates? No thanks.

BTW the picture on the right is the world renowned Valrhona Chocolate School which, needless to say, is state-of-the-art and extremely difficult to get in. See how small the logo is?