Chocolate. It’s a necessity in every woman’s life, right? But have you ever stopped to wonder where we get all our chocolate?

Cocoa beans, of course. Cocoa trees grow best in tropical regions near the equator, and over 60% of the world’s cocoa beans come from West Africa. While other industries have made strides towards ethically-produced goods, the chocolate industry was not one of them.

After reading a book depicting illegal child labor and slavery on cocoa farms in Africa, Dutchman Teun van de Keuken’s eyes were opened wide. He began devoting his time to bring awareness to this issue and seek solutions. However, Teun received very little cooperation with current chocolate producers, so in 2005 he began producing his own fair trade chocolate. It was a major hit!

Tony’s Chocolonely chocolate came to the US in 2015. You can find them in Whole Foods Market, Target, and Amazon. We ordered two large bars from the Thrive Market for $4.99. Pretty competitively priced! We tried the chocolate caramel sea salt and the dark chocolate almond sea salt, but there are many other flavor options.

These bars come packaged in foil, then wrapped with very attractive and informative paper. It’s a thick bar of chocolate that is unequally portioned in a unique design. Their website explains that the bars will remain unequally portioned until the chocolate industry achieves equality. Pretty cool idea! I like it.

And I love this chocolate! It is high quality and delicious, IMBHO-yes. I look forward to trying the other flavors!

If you’re interested in learning more, check out Tony’s YouTube channel for tons of informative videos! I’ve shared a couple below to get you started!