BUSINESS editor Laura Knowlson visits York-based chocolate maker Choc Affair as it celebrates its first decade in business.

Having started when mother-of-two Linda Barrie began experimenting with dairy-free chocolate in her kitchen at home, Choc Affair has grown over the last ten years to produce 50 tonnes of chocolate a year, with a team of 20 staff working out of its own manufacturing facility at Yorvale Business Park, off James Street.

York Press: Choc Affair (55284183)

The idea for the venture came about quite accidentally as Mrs Barrie set out trying to create hot chocolate for her two young daughters with milk intolerances.

Spotting the potential for a new business, Mrs Barrie enlisted the help of family and friends to test product ideas and create a brand, and on February 13, 2006 Choc Affair was born.

After moving into a small industrial unit in Naburn, the business relocated in 2013 to its 2,000 sq ft purpose-built headquarters at Yorvale Business Park, which offers room for further expansion of the business

Today Choc Affair's Fair Trade products are stocked across the country in independent retailers as well as Q Gardens, the Tate Modern, York Chocolate Story, and Centre Parks, with the business having recently secured Merlin as a stockist at its attractions across the UK.

And after being approached by a distributor in Australia, the Choc Affair brand is now on sale in the southern hemisphere.

With a product portfolio boasting a range of 18 different flavours, Mrs Barrie has attributed the success of the brand, and its year-on-year growth, to continued product development.

She said: "We have always focussed on our product range and developing that further.

"As a result we've seen growth year upon year in terms of both production and turnover. We grew by 20 per cent last year, and are aiming for similar levels this year.

"It's about seeking out new customers but also growing the customers that we already have, and taking on board what they want from new products.

"This year a big launch for us has been drinking chocolates. We've gone out with a six flavour range which has pushed us into a completely new market place which is great. We are now looking at expanding that into cafes and restaurants.

"We had realised it was a very key winter market segment. We had our hot chocolate on a stick, which was the product we launched the business with ten years ago.

"We knew we had to do something more up to date around hot chocolate, and we already had our signature flavours for our bars, so we thought we could replicate that into drinking chocolate. They have been incredibly well received."

York Press: Linda Barrie, piping chocolate at Choc Affair, Naburn. Pic: Mike Tipping (55284181)

Linda Barrie, piping chocolate at Choc Affair, Naburn. Picture: Mike Tipping

Alongside growing the business over the last ten years, Choc Affair has established its own charity - Seeds of Hope Uganda, which operates a sponsorship programme to support people in the village of Kumi in Uganda.

After its launch almost six years ago, Seeds of Hope has provided child sponsorship for 30 children as well as water treatment programmes, and in one case paid for a two-year-old girl called Sarah to have an operation to fix her leg which had broken when was she was a baby and was left to heal in the wrong position.

In support of the charity Choc Affair launched its own product, the 2:22 bar, with 10p from every sale going to the charity.

In more recent years the business has also signed up to support cocoa farmers in Columbia.

After visiting the country in 2014, Mrs Barrie was very taken with the people of the Huila region and jumped at the opportunity to partner with the ASOPECA co-operative, helping the farmers buy a piece of land.

Choc Affair's investment in this co-operative has progressed with the building of a fermentation system so the farmers can bring wet cacao beans to be fermented properly, increasing the quality of the bean and attracting a better price to enable a more sustainable business.

Going forward 2016 will see the business create a new website as it looks to grow its e-commerce trade, though despite its supply deal to Australia, exports are not in the immediate pipeline.

Mrs Barrie said: "We have got a lot more do to in the UK market before we target exports, but if someone approaches us that's great.

"We are still learning all the time. We rebranded last year, which was our biggest year in terms of development of the brand. We have gone for a much stronger looking brand identity.

"We've got a great team which we are proud to have grown over the last ten years. Very few people ever leave; it feels very much like a family here.

"We love it here in York. We love the fact that we are supporting the local economy, and employment, and that we are part of a city already steeped in the history of chocolate making."