Listeners with a sweet tooth will likely already be familiar with the Hotel Chocolat brand. Started in 1993, it has charmed UK shoppers with its meticulously produced chocolate and is now one of our most beloved chocolatiers. As the business prepares for one of its busiest times of the year, and what promises to be a very different ‘Covid’ Christmas, it’s also back on our TV screens this autumn, providing behind the scenes access into the running of the UK’s biggest chocolate maker.In this special episode of The Interview Series, Hotel Chocolat CEO and Co-founder, Angus Thirlwell, joins Martin Popplewell in conversation to talk about the business response to the global pandemic and ‘Retail Darwinism’, the growing importance of online sales and its increasing global appeal.They say ‘life is like a box of chocolates’, and that has never felt truer. A year that started full of promise has, well, turned out a little differently than we hoped—to put it mildly. For many in retail, profits may have melted in 2020 as a result of the pandemic. But at Hotel Chocolat, they remain positive about the future, with gifting and online sales protecting it from the worst of the impact on physical retail.

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“What did the council decide on item 42?” — answered with the speaker and the moment.

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