Donors receive 20% off chocolate for life after teaming up with a small local chocolate producer to employ staff laid off from Cadbury factory

This article is more than 2 years old

This article is more than 2 years old

New Zealanders have pledged NZ$2m (£1m) in just over 24 hours to keep the century-old tradition of chocolate-making alive in Dunedin.

Mondelez International announced in February it planned to close its 80-year-old Dunedin Cadbury factory in 2018, putting 350 employees out of work and shifting production to larger Australian plants.

A community group, Save the Factory, attempted to buy the Cadbury factory for NZ$20m, but their bid failed.

Sweet success? New Zealand crowdfunding campaign raises millions in bid to save chocolate factory Read more

Now, Save the Factory has teamed up with the boutique Dunedin chocolate producer Ocho to expand their business, allowing them to employ more people – including former Cadbury’s workers – and keep the tradition of making chocolate alive in New Zealand’s oldest city.

The crowdfunding page went live this week and in less than two days 3,500 people pledged a combined $2m to the expansion project, with the website crashing multiple times because of the huge interest.

Anyone who pledged $100 will receive one share in the new company, as well as 20% off chocolate produced there for their lifetime. The average pledge was NZ$700.

The $2m will allow chocolate manufacturing to continue in Dunedin on an industrial scale, with New Zealand-made chocolate destined for export. Without Ocho’s expansion, chocolate-making in the city would have dwindled to a handful of enthusiasts making tiny quantities with minimal employees.

Liz Rowe, owner of Ocho, said she had expected the fundraising effort to take weeks, not days, and the groundswell of support showed how important chocolate and jobs were to the people of Dunedin.

“Saving some of those jobs was a huge impetus,” said Rowe. “One of the values of the new company is to create as many jobs as possible.

“Dunedin is a regional centre and there is a strong feeling in this community that we don’t want to see all these businesses get bought up and shipped out and moved either further north or offshore; there is a strong feeling to keep manufacturing here, to keep jobs local.”

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Ocho’s Liz Rowe said she expected the fundraising to take weeks, not days Photograph: Hayden Parsons/Otago Polytechnic

Ocho will begin increasing production immediately now it has secured expansion funding with plans to move to a bigger factory, import new equipment from Italy and explore options to export the distinctly New Zealand-flavoured chocolate, which features local ingredients including kawakawa and horopito (native pepper trees), and manuka honey and bee pollen.

Ocho will gradually shift from producing 90kg of chocolate a week to 400-500kg a week by the middle of next year.

A local Dunedin councillor and businessman, Jim O’Malley, who spearheaded the Save the Factory campaign, said pledges came not only from Dunedin but all over New Zealand and the world.