Before we share the real highlights, we want to say one thing above all: thank you! THANK YOU for encouraging us to keep going despite all the hurdles! We wish you a wonderful Christmas, lots of snow, and a great start to 2019… And we'll definitely all meet again soon in the Chocolate Wonderland!
The truly greatest insights and surprises for us were:
- You're truly grateful! Many have told us how difficult it is to find good chocolate when you suffer from an allergy (especially a nut allergy) or celiac disease. And, of course, that's especially difficult for the children. So it's all the more wonderful that we were able to make children's hearts happy with Dammenberg and Plamil.
- You're giving us something back! When you hear how happy a mother is over the phone about finally finding chocolate for her child, we know we did everything right and that it was worth all the effort. That's simply wonderful...
- You're really understanding of the sometimes long delivery times! We now have many varieties in stock, but sometimes we have to reorder chocolate from Finland or England. And that takes a long time, sometimes a full 10 days. You understand and wait patiently. That was simply fantastic of you!!! But we'll still work on being faster in the future...
- Nice conversations with you : Sometimes you call us, and then really nice conversations develop! You tell us about your problems, and we tell you about the hurdles we have to overcome before the chocolate finally reaches you. This way, we understand what you need, and you understand that in the Chocolate Wonderland, there are no fully automated processes; everything is truly "handcrafted," and we are personally there for you. Not all online shops are created equal; there can be so much more...
- You're amazing! You ordered so much chocolate so quickly that the deliveries hadn't even reached the chocolate wonderland before they were sold out! That was supposed to be enough for the next six months 🙂 You love these flavors the most: Dammenberg's milk chocolate coins, Plamil's milk-free spread , Plamil's so-free milk alternative chocolate, and Dammenberg's Venezuela milk chocolate . We'll just have to order more of these...
But there were also painful insights and shocking experiences:
- Sometimes you had to wait a very long time. Yes, we're sorry! We simply underestimated the high demand at the beginning 🙁 We hate to disappoint you when you're so excited about the chocolate. But we'll definitely improve on that!
- Packages that never arrived, even though they did arrive ! Yes, that really shocked us and tore a huge hole in our budget! The vast majority of customers are friendly and honest, we have to mention that! But unfortunately, there are also some who don't have a guilty conscience and claim a package wasn't delivered, even though it clearly arrived! We don't operate for profit; the "loss" of these goods increases our losses, and unfortunately, we will probably have to consider how to prevent this from happening again next year. We're considering increasing the flat rate shipping fee or the minimum order value... It's a shame that everyone has to suffer because a few unscrupulous people!
- Bureaucratic madness! Without wanting to bore you, it has exceeded everything we feared. The packaging regulations, accounting, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), and much more take up so much time, so much time that it's sometimes quite frustrating...
- Packing parcels takes too long! We can't continue at this pace. Including shipping, we estimate it takes half an hour to pack one parcel. No one would believe how much work it is to fold parcels, fill them, create delivery notes, seal them, create parcel labels, and take everything to the post office. We definitely need to optimize this area as well, but currently, for example, we're still sending too few parcels to be allowed to use DHL's interfaces. Until then, we still have to fill out every parcel label by hand on the computer...
Even though the last few points may sound a bit negative, the past year was a very successful one for us. It was fun talking and writing with you, and we hope we made many people happy with delicious chocolate!
Happy New Year!
We’ll definitely see you again soon in the chocolate wonderland…