Toblerone

This article is about the chocolate bar. For the Austrian defensive line, see Toblerone line.
Toblerone
Product type Confectionery
Owner Mondelēz International
Country Switzerland
Introduced 1908
Related brands List of Kraft brands
Previous owners Kraft General Food (-2012), Jacobs Suchard AG (-1990), Interfood S.A. (-1982), Tobler (-1970)
Website http://www.toblerone.ch
Toblerone

Toblerone (/ˈtoʊbləroʊn/; German: [tobləˈroːnə]) is a Swiss chocolate bar brand[1] owned by US confectionery company Mondelēz International, Inc., formerly Kraft Foods, which acquired the product from former owner Jacobs Suchard in 1990. It is produced in Bern and in early 2000 was being produced in the United States by Ferrara Pan candy company in Bellwood, Illinois. Toblerone is well known for its distinctive triangular prism shape.

History

Toblerone was created by Theodor Tobler (1876–1941) in Bern, Switzerland, in 1908. Theodor Tobler, with his cousin Emil Baumann, developed a unique milk chocolate including nougat, almonds and honey with a distinctive triangular shape. The image of a bear is hidden in the Matterhorn high mountain, symbolizing the town of the chocolate's origin.[2]

The triangular shape of the Matterhorn in the Swiss Alps is commonly believed to have given Theodor Tobler his inspiration for the shape of Toblerone. However, according to Theodor's sons, the triangular shape originates from a pyramid shape that dancers at the Folies Bergères created as the finale of a show that Theodor saw.[3]

Some early advertisements for Tobler chocolate appeared in the international languages Esperanto[4] and Ido.[5]

Theodor Tobler applied for a patent for the Toblerone manufacturing process in Bern in 1909.[6] The Toblerone brand was trademarked in 1909, at the Federal Institute for Intellectual Property in Bern.[6]

The Tobler company was independent for many years. In 1970, it merged with Suchard, the makers of Milka, to become Interfood. The Tobler company merged with the Jacobs coffee company in 1982 to create Jacobs Suchard. Mondelēz (Kraft Foods at that time) acquired the majority of Jacobs Suchard, including Toblerone, in 1990.

Name

The product's name is a portmanteau combining Tobler's name with the Italian word torrone (a type of nougat).[7][8]

Sizes and variants

Imaginative advertising in the 1960s included the production of a model Volkswagen Type 2 by Corgi Toys, featuring Toblerone designs on its side panels

Bar sizes range from ten centimetres to nearly one metre, all similarly proportioned. According to Schott's Food & Drink Miscellany the sizes and number of peaks for Toblerones are as follows:

Size Tiny Mini 35 g 50 g 75 g 100 g 200 g 400 g 750 g 4.5 kg
Peaks 3 3 8 11 11 12 15 15 17 12

For the yearly Toblerone Schoggifest, a special oversized bar is created to celebrate the bar's anniversary. The bar's weight represents the years of Toblerone, with the first bar in 2008 weighing 100 kg.[9]

In 1932 Tobler made the first filled bars of chocolate, the Tobler-O-rum.

Since the 1970s, other variants of Toblerone have been produced. These include:

Plain chocolate
(dark chocolate) in a green or black triangular box
White chocolate
in a white triangular box
Snowtop
editions with white chocolate peaks, also in a white/silver triangular box
Filled editions
milk chocolate with a white chocolate centre (blue triangular box)
OneByOne
individually wrapped triangular chunks
Toblerone Pralines
released in 1997, a single peaked version in the distinctive yellow packaging
Fruit and Nut
in 2007 with a half purple triangular cardboard box
Honeycomb crisp
with a half white box with honeycomb pieces pictured on it
Crunchy Salted Almond
with honey and almond nougat and salted caramelised almonds
Berner Bär
500 g milk chocolate bar, with a relief portrait of the Bernese Bear and the Coat of arms of Bern on its face. The only non-triangular Toblerone.[10]
Toblerone Tobelle
Toblerone thins in a yellow triangular box

Manufacturing

It has in the past been manufactured in other locations including Bedford in England. In the 1970s and 1980s, it was manufactured under license for the Yugoslav market by Kraš in Zagreb (present-day Croatia).

Similar products

A similar product is the Croatian product Kolumbo, made by factory Kraš from Zagreb. This chocolate is also composed of pyramids of hazelnuts and honey. Kraš was producing Toblerone under license during the 1970s and 1980s. Another comparable product is Mahony,[11] produced by the company Chocolat-Frey AG in Switzerland.

Cultural impact

The distinct pyramidal shape of the bar lent its name to the Toblerone line, a series of anti-tank emplacements prevalent in Switzerland's border areas.

In 1995 it was revealed that the Swedish politician Mona Sahlin had bought, among other things, two bars of Toblerone using her Riksdag credit card (i.e., with taxpayers' money). This became known as the Toblerone affair. Sahlin was forced to step down as a candidate for the post as Prime Minister. She returned to politics in 1998.[12]

A triangular shaped set of student residences on the Oxford Road, Manchester, for students of the University of Manchester built circa 1975 and resembling the chocolate bar are known as the Toblerones.[13][14]

A renowned British national radio broadcast, Alan Partridge, once suffered from an alleged addiction of Toblerone leading him to have severe weight gain.

In theatre production, a three-sided, free-standing, wheeled version of the standard theatre flat is commonly called a "Toblerone" or "Tobe" due to its physical resemblance to the confection.

From 1973 until its demolition in 2013, there was an iron ore silo in Almería, Spain, nicknamed "Toblerone" due to its similarities with the shape of this chocolate bar.

Alleged child labour

In 2013, Stop the Traffik - a charity that aims to stop human trafficking - ran a campaign titled "When Will Toblerone Be Traffik-Free?", which aimed to target Toblerone's use of children in the harvesting of the ingredient, cocoa. 16,000 'postcards' were sent out to campaigners, which were then signed and returned to Stop the Traffik's London office. These postcards were then hand delivered to Mondelēz's headquarters.[15]

See also

References

  1. ↑ "Brand Family". Mondelezinternational.com. Retrieved 2016-02-11.
  2. ↑ "Hidden bear in Toblerone". Moillusions.com. March 27, 2007. Retrieved 2009-06-07.
  3. ↑ "Our secret". The name and the shape. Kraft Foods. 2009. Retrieved 2010-02-14.
  4. ↑ "Tobler (fama pro Toblerone) estis Esperantisto. Tobler (famous for Toblerone...)". google.com.
  5. ↑ "Home". Swissworld.org. Retrieved 2016-02-11.
  6. 1 2 "Toblerone: 1909". How it All Began: Tobler's Chocolate. Kraft Foods. 2006. Retrieved 2008-02-03.
  7. ↑ "TOBLERONE - Questions et Réponses". Toblerone.ch. Retrieved 2016-02-11.
  8. ↑ "La marque suisse: Toblerone - Toutes Taxes Comprises - TV - Play RTS - Radio Télévision Suisse". Rts.ch. 2010-04-30. Retrieved 2016-02-11.
  9. ↑ "TOBLERONE - Toblerone Schoggifest 2010". Toblerone.ch. Retrieved 2016-02-11.
  10. ↑ http://web.archive.org/web/20081218073956/http://www.toblerone.com:80/just_ask/faq_product-en.html. Archived from the original on December 18, 2008. Retrieved January 1, 2009. Missing or empty |title= (help)
  11. ↑ "Chocolat Frey". Chocolatfrey.ch. Retrieved 2016-02-11.
  12. ↑ Svensson, Britta (2007-01-05). "Nej det handlade inte bara om Toblerone..." (in Swedish). Expressen. Retrieved 2007-01-24.
  13. ↑ "University of Manchester". The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition. Retrieved 3 November 2014.
  14. ↑ "The Whitworth Park Residencel publisher=Our Manchester - Manchester History Net". Retrieved 3 November 2014.
  15. ↑ "Campaign - Traffik Free Chocolate :: Stop the Traffik". STOP THE TRAFFIK.

Bibliography

External links

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