A bittersweet Easter for Belgian chocolatiers

Health officials in Belgium have declared chocolate factories "essential businesses", allowing chocolatiers to continue to sell chocolate eggs and Easter bunnies during the coronavirus lockdown.

Despite being able to stay open, sales are still down on previous years, with the crisis hitting during peak season.

Head of the Royal Belgian Association of the Chocolate, Pralines, Biscuit and Confectionary Guy Gallet said Easter usually represents "15 to 25 per cent of the yearly income" for those in the chocolate industry but "this year that percentage is likely to be far lower."

In Belgium, the production of chocolate has an annual turnover of €6 billion ($10.3b) with an annual consumption of 6kgs per person.

"Most of the chocolatiers are living from tourists; thank God I have a lot of locals who are shopping in my place, but I am afraid if we do not get tourists anymore it will be a disaster, even in the future…" said Dominique Persoone, a chocolate-shop owner in Bruges.

The immediate challenge is keeping the Easter spirit — and the chocolatiers' craft — alive in these trying times.

A big part is humour: the use of medical masks made of white chocolate is an obvious one. Persoone puts them on eggs.

"It is laughing with a hard thing. And on the other hand, we still have to keep fun, no? It is important to laugh in life."

Genevieve Trepant of the Cocoatree chocolatier in Lonzee, southeast of Brussels, saw a funny photo of a bunny with a facemask.

It got her thinking and she now sells chocolate bunnies with a facemask of white chocolate.

Part of the money from sales goes to the King Baudouin Foundation, a major charitable foundation supporting healthcare staff.

"It all started as humour, but then we decided to make something meaningful out of it, so this is my small contribution," she said.

Like Persoone, who donated sanitary gel no longer needed in his factory to a local hospital, Trepant also thought of the needy.

That's how the Lapinou Solidaire and its partner, the Lapinou Confine — the Caring Bunny and the Quarantined Bunny, both adorned with a white mask — were born.

Customers are encouraged to gift Trepant's €12 ($20) bunnies to local medical staff to show their support. Part of the proceeds go to charity.

- Reported with Associated Press

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