Everyone knows by now a great deal of work goes into making Barkeater Chocolates products, but not many people consider the time and effort it takes to package the delicious treat inside. From our bars to bark or peanut butter cups to bear bombs, each type of chocolate has had a variety of packaging over the years that have only improved.
Take our Barkeater Bars, for example. The rainbow that is our bar collection is easily tear-able, being made from metallic film. Not only are our bar wrappers colorful and cute, but they are funny as well. Each bar comes with a quirky description of its taste and a sarcastic disclaimer that warns the eater of its addictive cocoa properties. The big, bold title of the chocolate easily draws the customer to it; and since we’ve last changed our packaging for the bars, our customers have an easier time finding them in the store.
After our bars are tempered, molded and set, they go onto our packaging machine, whom we named Flo Wrappa. Flo came from the U.K. and joined our family in 2017, where she made productivity skyrocket. The bars sit on the moving belt of the 17 foot machine and are wrapped, sealed and cut. Afterwards, they are shot out for our packagers to inspect, sticker and box for shipping.
Back in Barkeater’s early days, packagers would hand wrap the bars in green foil.
Over that foil was a printed piece of paper stock, which was wrapped and glued on. The process was time consuming, so Barkeater found better ways over the decade to package our bars.
The same for our Grown Up Peanut Butter Cups. For a long while, the process for packaging a peanut butter cup was far different. Three cups went into translucent plastic bags, which was hard to handle, as they barely fit and would often fall out. As a result, packagers would have to glue the peanut butter cups down on the inside and wait for them to dry before sealing the bags.
Since Flo, Barkeater has found what we believe to be the peak of peanut butter cup packaging, at least for us. It is as simple as putting two peanut butter cups together on Flo’s belt and running them through to be packaged, cut and inspected. Our packaging for the peanut butter cups has been successful for a while now, and one lot can take as little as ten minutes to seal.
Barkeater packagers spend the most amount of time on bark, as we have to weigh them out after breaking the bark into pieces. However, we have come a long way. First, our packagers would break up the bark and weigh it before hand sealing it in a plastic bag. That bag would be placed in a small cardboard box, which our packagers put together themselves, before labeling it with printed stickers. Now, thanks to our labeling machine and pre-labeled bags, packagers simply have to slip the chocolate in and seal it.
If a customer had eaten Barkeater Chocolates a decade ago, and then returned for more, they’d find themselves opening a completely different package (but eating the same delicious chocolate). Things are always changing and improving at Barkeater, so stop by often to see what’s new!