Our company

Rainforest Friendly chocolate was founded in 2007 by Ania Rymszewicz and Marcin Gerwin from Earh Conservation who teamed up with Jacek Kuropatwinski who had been successfully running his company Floralex for couple of years.

Earth Conservation is a small non-profit group working for sustainable development. Part of the income from sales of the Rainforest Friendly chocolate is earmarked for our projects.

Our key partner is a Swiss company Chocolat Stella which is the manufacturer of our chocolate bars. There are also farmers from all over the world - there are more ingredients in chocolate besides cocoa! There is sugar cane from Paraguay, milk from dairy farmers from Switzerland and coffee from Peru and Guatemala. Vanilla comes from the Mananara region in the North of Madagascar. Vanilla blossoms are pollinated there by hand on small plots with 20 to 40 vines each. Vines are planted in a traditional style at the base of large rainforest trees. When pods are ripe they are harvested, blanched in hot water, then wrapped in woolen blankets and kept in warm and dry place for two to three weeks. During this fermentation phase day after day women of Mananara rub beans with their fingers cleaning them and rendering. Without the work of farmers production of this chocolate wouldn't be possible.

See where the vanilla we use comes from

From the very beginning we are trying to run our company as a sustainable business. That's not always easy! Lets take the packaging for example. There was no good quality recycled carton available for production of chocolate boxes. We were the first company asking for it. As a compromise we decided to use paper made from wood from the sustainably managed forests. We have agreed for "Carta solida" paperboard, which is made in Finland. The exciting thing about this paper is that the energy to produce it comes from the bioenergy power plant.

We are committed to buying shade grown cocoa and in this way providing a habitat for wildlife. All ingredients in our chocolate are organic and they are bought under a Fairtrade scheme. The FAIRTRADE Mark on our chocolate bars ensures that Fairtrade certified growers receive an agreed and stable price for their products.