Revisiting Charlie’s Chocolate Factory in 2.0

The below BLAB is today being featured in Technology Sunday, a supplement in the Sunday Times of Malta.

When Willy Wonka decided to reveal his secret chocolate recipes he hid a limited number of tickets in chocolate bars. Charlie was lucky enough to find one of the five golden tickets and could then experience what it’s like to get inside a real chocolate factory. At that time, Charlie Bucket had no Facebook profile and the genius behind the Wonka Chocolate Empire could at best have dreamt of the world-wide (Wonka) web.

It only took an ex-NASA Space Shuttle entrepreneur and the brain behind the full range of Wired content brands to revisit Wonka’s business ideas and open the door to an amazing chocolate venture they called Tcho. Technology and chocolate drive Louis Rosetto and Timothy Childs to pursue Tcho. Both of them have vast experience in a multitude of projects. In 1993 Rosetto co-founded Wired Magazine and became its first editor. Wired Books, Wired TV and a list of digital ventures including HotBot.com followed. Childs on the other hand worked at NASA Space Shuttle, launched Cabaret Chocolates and has been involved in a number of community building projects such as Web3D RoundUp.

Tcho involves chocolate enthusiasts and customers in the making of its chocolate products. Tcho Beta precedes any Tcho chocolate products. Limited batches of chocolate are packaged in simple brown paper bags and made available to customers who want to be part of Tcho’s continuous flavour developments. Varieties of the chocolate beta are constantly produced with new versions emerging as often as every 36 hours. The beta products are made available online or at the Tcho factory store. Following a lengthy beta process, the end product is launched, this time with proper branded packaging and bigger mass runs.

The Tcho community aspect does not stop here. Tcho makes its ‘secret’ recipe available on its website for the community to try out. Recently Tcho founders even commissioned an iPhone application which will enable users of the device to monitor the Tcho labs wherever they are.

With the founders’ technological background and love for chocolate it comes as no surprise that the Tcho project follows a similar product development process found in an IT company. However what really stands out in the Tcho business plan is not the technical expertise of the founding team but the strong community engagement enabled by but not limited to web 2.0 tools such as blogs and online social networks.

2.0 is a vague concept for many of us. There are many brands, even locally, which have their own Facebook page or blog but one basic rule must lie at the heart of any strategy: 2.0 may sound geeky, technical and complex but in truth it is as simple as putting communities at the centre. The latter is not really optional.

When brands forget to put the community at the centre of their digital strategy, the community, enabled by the web and the social networks which reside on it, jumps into the brand’s driving seat. Cadbury conceived Wispa back in 1981. The first trial was a massive success selling 10,000 bars. Consequently, in 1983 Wispa was launched on a larger scale and grew more popular then ever. Wispa’s success story seemed to have come to an end in 2003 when Cadbury decided to stop producing the popular chocolate bar following a slowdown in sales.

However, the community thought otherwise. More than 5000 fans joined an online group on Bebo and campaigned for a Wispa comeback. Not only did the group manage to trigger buzz online but some of the fans even went as far as going up on stage during Iggy Pop’s performance at Glastonbury Festival. On stage they held a big banner which read ‘Bring back Wispa’. Cadbury, which had probably invested in serious market research before pulling the plug on the product, reconsidered its decision and committed to a 23 million run, saying it was the first time it had resumed production of a product because of online pressure.

So let’s revisit Willy Wonka’s business case in 2.0 mode: For a start Willy Wonka would not keep his chocolate making recipe a secret; on the contrary he would instead put that at the test of Wonka’s loyal customer base. Wonka would be wise enough to know that Facebook is much more than a tool which connects people, that there’s more to blogging than a modern version of a personal diary echoing in the absence of readers, and that Twitter does not only tell you what your neighbour has been up to lately. Charlie Bucket, an ordinary customer who is loyal to the Wonka brand would probably run the ilovewonka.com blog which would also be present on Facebook. Wonka fans would join the group and invite their friends. Instead of limiting the factory tour to 5 lucky chocolate enthusiasts, the Wonka empire would have a virtual tour of the factory or a live webcam of its daily operations. Willy Wonka would not have to run the golden ticket promotion because he would head hunt Charlie as the next CEO. And, lastly, you could be the next Charlie Bucket running the Wonka Chocolate Empire.

One may not know everything about Web 2.0 and how it can help drive a successful strategy but, before opening up to innovative applications and web services, one should understand that 2.0 is first and foremost an extremely social concept.