Exclusive: Chocolate firm snaps up £10m contract

The Skipton-based business, which was set up more than 120 years ago, will be the sole supplier of mint crisps to the confectionery firm, providing 300,000 a day.

The deal is worth between 2m and 2.5m a year for four years and will help Whitakers take turnover close to 11m a year, as well as creating 25 jobs.

It comes after a challenging last 12 months in which the firm was forced to deal with the international surge in commodity prices, the fall in the value of sterling and the cost of getting credit.

William Whitaker, the fourth generation of the firm to be involved in the business, said yesterday: "This is fantastic news for the local community, not only securing the future of our current 115-strong workforce, but also creating more jobs.

"The volatility of cocoa prices made 2009 a tough year for us, but this major contract will provide stability and help us to continue to develop our niche chocolate business.

"Elizabeth Shaw is one of the leading brands of after dinner chocolates and its mints crisps account for the largest percentage of its sales. It's great for two of the country's oldest chocolate makers to be joining forces.

"Once fully operational, we will be producing close to two million chocolates a day."

Whitakers, which makes after-dinner chocolates for the catering and retail sectors under its Whitakers brand and also under supermarkets' and wholesalers' own labels, already sells to Aldi, Asda, Waitrose, Tesco and Costco.

It has invested 200,000 setting up new lines dedicated to the Elizabeth Shaw production and they will start running this week, following four months of development work.

Whitakers is one of the leading suppliers of personalised chocolates to hotels and restaurants around Britain.

One of the best-known examples of its contract work is its Calendar Girls chocolates, which enabled the women of Rylstone and District Women's Institute to raise more money for Leukaemia Research.

The firm donated 20p from each box of plain chocolate Neapolitan squares, wrapped in pictures from the original calendar.

Last year, Whitakers was affected by the rise in the price of cocoa – 40 per cent of which is produced in the Ivory Coast – caused by El Nino, the climate changing phenomenon which impacts on the Americas. The price rose in 2009 and early this year before inching down in the second half of February.

Whitakers – the sweet taste of success

The firm began as a grocery store in Crosshills, North Yorkshire, and went on to become bakers and confectioners before opening a shop in Skipton in 1926.

Whitakers Chocolates was formed in 1961 by William's father, John, who is chairman today. It invested in automated chocolate production as it wanted to move away from the low value of goods, short shelf life and limited sales of the bakery business.

Today, it has more than 100 staff and its core products are wafers, chocolate "crisps", creams and neapolitans. Black and white images of the first John Whitaker in a starched, grandad collar at the end of the 19th century, adorn the chocolate boxes.