Accessible annual transparency reports are also readily available, breaking down clear financial data, along with partner-producer interviews and helpful articles explaining how fair financing is calculated and ethical practices ensured. The company really encourages its consumers to engage with their model of Direct Trade, with videos online that show its tangible progress in partner communities that put a human face to the cacao sourcing process. Taza pays at least $500 above the market price for commodity cacao, a significant 15-20% premium, considerably more than the FairTrade price. chocolate maker to establish a Direct Trade Cacao Certification program certified by a third party. Under the Direct Trade paradigm, middle men are eradicated: Taza purchases certified USDA organic cacao beans directly from cacao producers who they visit at least once a year. Jesse Last (right) pictured with a cacao farmer in Haiti after Hurricane MatthewĮstablishing and maintaining fair and transparent Direct Trade relationships with all cacao farmers is a priority.
Taza’s sourcing manager, Jesse Last, pictured below, makes a meaningful and laudable commitment to get to know its producers at each origin and to guarantee transparency in the sourcing process, bringing this information openly and directly to consumers. Taza’s self-proclaimed position as a “pioneer in ethical cacao sourcing” is well deserved. Alex’s wife, Kathleen Fulton, has also been central to the development of Taza, designing all of the packaging as Brand Manager. Eventually, Alex developed a factory space in Somerville, MA, in which he united an eclectic mix of traditional and vintage machinery. Licks to roast his cacao beans at night in their coffee roaster. With the goal in mind of revolutionising American chocolate with the addition of this new kind, Alex made the first batch of Taza Chocolate by hand back in his apartment after coming to an arrangement with Boston ice cream chain J.P. Alex was so inspired by the region and its chocolate that he apprenticed under a molinero in Oaxaca in order to learn these authentic techniques, even hand-carving his own granite mill stones. It was on a trip the state of Oaxaca in Mexico that Alex first encountered stone ground chocolate, created using traditional hand-carved millstones known as molinos. Whilst studying for a degree in anthropology at Vassar College, Alex first learned of the traditions at the origin of chocolate in Mesoamerica. This is chocolate as it used to be, packing hundreds of years of history in every bite. Its chocolate is organic and proudly unrefined, creating the grainy texture that is its signature. Taza pride themselves on sourcing the best cacao in the fairest way possible to the producer whilst making this process transparent to its consumers, who are encouraged to engage with the process from bean to bar.Īt Taza, simplicity is key. Fundamental to its ethos is a deep commitment to ethical cacao sourcing, establishing meaningful relationships with their partners in a Direct Trade model which eliminates the middle man in order to guarantee optimum prices for farmers. Taza is all about cacao with a conscience.
He makes chocolate in his factory, on the site of a car wrecking yard just a stone’s throw away from Harvard University. After experiencing traditional stone-ground chocolate created using authentic and ancient techniques during a trip to Mexico, Alex decided to revolutionise US chocolate making by bringing these practices home with him to Massachusetts.
#Taza chocolate zip#
Alex was one of one of Zip Car’s earliest employees and is living proof of the deeply transformative power of chocolate. Taza was launched in 2005 by Alex Whitmore and his wife Kathleen Fulton.
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