This is long overdue…
…and I really hope you’ll get another from me before the year’s out (maybe even two if I’m feeling organised).
It feels weird to be writing about October on the 11th of November. Halloween O’bar, with all its orangey, sticky, messy goodness, feels like months ago now.
What did you guys think of the Halloween O’bar, by the way? I’ll admit, the execution on the finish could’ve been a little neater. But like most things we do here, it was made with passion, excitement, a dash of chaos.
I wanted to make a bleeding O’bar. Little did I realise what that meant from a production perspective… hand-injecting thousands of bars with sticky orange goo. Nightmare.
But tell me, was it worth it? Was Halloween O’bar a win? Did the tangy, sour orange and smooth milk choc combo hit the spot? Do you want to see it again sometime? I feel like it was a proper Marmite moment… most of you loved it (I think), but just how many of you?
On the topic of O’bars… have you seen “Safe Subs” and “Wild Thangs”? (And yes, you have to say Thaa-aang or it doesn’t count.)
We’ve finally launched our O’bar Subscription!
I know. About bloody time.
The plan was to launch earlier, but between website chaos, coding marathons with our new web wizard, and about ten other fires to put out… we went live later than I imagined. Not perfect but live! And that’s the main thing.
You can now order basically any combination of O’bars you wish. I’ll tackle the inventory-tracking side of that in the new year (wish me luck), but for now, we have a working subscription setup and I’m genuinely so excited.
Why? Because you’ll get regular drop-offs, in my totally unbiased opinion, the best chocolate bars around. No shipping fees and exclusive Wild Thang flavours. This is the start of a new kinda Choco community that I’ve been longing to get live!
For December, your flavour, if you have selected Wild Thang, won’t be exclusive, it’ll match what’s live on our site. Why? So we can test our systems and make sure everything actually works. This one I needed to test properly before it got more complicated. First deliveries go out in December, then January if you choose every month and so on..
Now I want your feedback on it:
– Does the setup make sense?
– Is it clear how it works?
– Anything confusing you’d change?
– Or just general thoughts…
We had a Pumpkin & Pizza Night at Choco HQ 🎃🍕
Everyone carved pumpkins, and we posted them all on our Insta Stories so you guys could vote for the winner. I told the team there’d be a voucher up for grabs, so of course, now they all think I rigged the competition because… I won. 😅
For the record (and for any of the Catherine’s Originals team reading this): I promise I did not vote for myself, and I did not give myself a voucher. 🤣
We shot our first Christmas shoot in early October. It had been booked and planned since July and I thought, “Easy! October gives us loads of time to gear up for Christmas.”
Wrong again.
Next year we’ll be shooting Christmas in June, that’s for sure. Note to future me: allow more time. You can never do enough prep.
And getting an 11ft real Christmas tree delivered that early? No easy task. Let’s just say… it’s currently held upright in a wicker basket filled to the top with patio bricks. Real glamour over here at Choco HQ! 🎄😂
We hit 10,000 followers on Instagram! 🎉
10k of you crazy, chocolate-loving legends are now along for the ride and it only took us four years to get there!
That’s where we share giveaways, competitions, and daily peeks behind the scenes at Choco HQ, so if you haven’t already, come hang out with me on there. It’s a proper little community of chocoholics and chaos. 💛
Long days. Late nights. Machines deciding to have their own opinions about whether they’ll work today. Endless deliveries of stripy boxes arriving by the pallet load.
We finally got all your pre-ordered Advents ready and they’re starting to ship this week! Seeing them all boxed up and heading out into the world honestly makes this all worth it. Now, just for you guys to try them!
We’re officially in the grab-and-go lunch phase of the year, the kind where meals happen standing up between packing runs and someone always forgets where they put their coffee (usually me).
You may have seen her… Catherine Santa! 🎅✨
Yes, my bottom is showing. It’s caused quite the stir already, but I can confirm… she’s going to be launched this year! We’ll be officially launching Catherine Santa very soon, so keep your eyes peeled.
She’s quite possibly the cutest little Santa figurine you’ll ever see, the perfect stocking filler, made from our super scrummy, deliciously creamy, vegan milk chocolate.
Stay Sweet, Choco Lovers,
Catherine x
