Grand Theft Chocolate
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Smart, sharp, and slightly unhinged. Late night's fresh perspective. The Last Show with David Cooper. In the UK, at least, chocolate bars are being locked in anti-theft boxes in stores because they're being stolen to order. We're not talking Diamond Heist. We're not talking stolen iPhones, but we're talking food theft here with Sylvain Charlebois, the food professor at Dalhousie University. Check out his podcast called The Food Professor Podcast. Sylvain, welcome to the show. Oh, thank you, David. At what point does chocolate become the Rolex of the snack aisle that people covet? And if you can't afford it, you might steal it. What's going on with chocolate theft?
What is causing the spike in chocolate theft?
There's always a pattern. As soon as a product goes up in price at the grocery store, or if media talks a lot about it, it tends to attract crime, criminals. You'll see heists, you'll see theft increase. We've seen that with cheese, for example, meat products. They were heists in Canada in recent months related to meat products. But I'm not surprised with chocolate because we've been talking about chocolate prices for a while. I mean, the price of chocolate, cocoa futures were almost at $12,000 US a metric ton. I think it was less than a year ago. Why? Because both the Ivory Coast and Ghana couldn't produce enough and demand for cocoa was actually rising, especially in Asia. And so the... Previous record was about 3,500, 4,000.
So as you can imagine, there was a lot of panic and a lot of manufacturers are paying more for their cocoa. So that's why a lot of people are seeing higher prices. But when that happens, of course, criminals are paying attention.
For organized criminals who steal a lot of chocolate, what makes it like the perfect crime commodity? Is it because it's shelf-stable, because it provides a lot of calories, because it's universally loved, or because it's just expensive? If you steal it and then resell it, you can really get a good buck?
Seriously, do you know anyone in your life that doesn't like chocolate? Seriously.
Yes, I know one person. I also know one person who doesn't like pasta. And that is insane to me. That is the best food in the world. If I could choose one food, I do. But to answer your question more generally, no, everyone loves it.
Well, exactly. And so that's why it's easy to find a market. It's shelf stable. You don't need a cold chain, an expensive cold chain. And so whenever I see a heist of meat, I say, well, that group has a market already. So the black market will actually emerge because of higher prices. And so people will actually steal something for someone or a group of people. So they already have a buyer for some of these products with chocolate.
How do rising prices influence food theft patterns?
You're not in a hurry. You don't have to be in a hurry. You can actually store it for a while.
Interesting. Now, when prices of commodities go up, I suppose people are more likely to steal them. Side note, we're not advocating theft here. You mentioned chocolate futures in the past being at an all time high. I mean, eventually there's only so much demand and supply is variable. The supply will go up. Are prices set to drop from here? Is my chocolate bar going to be cheaper in the future?
That's a really good question because right now, since November, I would say that we've seen Cocoa Futures drop, I mean, dramatically. They're below $3,500 US a metric ton now. That's a huge drop in just a few months. So a lot of people were asking me, are my Valentine's Day chocolate going to be cheaper? No, not for this year. Maybe for next year.
I do wonder, though, just because a metric ton is cheaper for a manufacturer to buy, will they then lower the price? Or have they basically tricked us as consumers to spend 20 bucks on the chocolate box? They know that we're still willing to do it. So they just take a higher margin and lower cocoa prices in like raw cocoa prices or I guess processed whatever. Doesn't mean that my box of beloved Valentine's chocolate price will go down.
You raise a good point. Nobody really knows. It just gives the ability for... So whenever I'm asked a question, will chocolate be cheaper?
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