For 15 Years, East Bay Company the Xocolate Bar Has Carved a Path Against the Odds | Eater SF

"Run by Malena Lopez-Maggi in Berkeley, the Xocolate Bar began from a metalsmithing sensibility—Lopez-Maggi and her partner Clive Brown were captivated at a 2005 KPFA craft fair by the idea of sculpting and painting with edible minerals—and evolved into a small but resilient chocolate maker that has been in business for about 15 years. I describe a company that leaned into vegan recipes early because milk curdled the flavor profiles they wanted, struggled through long shared-kitchen days (they first rented space in the Presidio Yacht Club), and then leased a larger Berkeley space in 2008 with production in back and a tiny retail front. Margins have remained thin and growth has been constrained by lack of traditional financing and intergenerational wealth, but she has recently used alternative funding—Kiva microloans, a bank loan, and a GoFundMe—to buy equipment; she notes the fridge is 25 years old and they can’t keep running on two 10-pound tempering machines. Seasonal highs (Valentine’s to Christmas) have long determined survival, but the pandemic forced a pivot to online sales and wholesale platforms like Faire, turning the Solano Avenue shop into a mini-warehouse and quadrupling volume since before COVID; even so, Lopez-Maggi says the business is at a bursting point—doing seven to eight times the volume of a decade ago but struggling to find affordable space to scale." - Paolo Bicchieri