If you're already a chocri fan, you know chocri chocolate bars are delicious, luxurious and crafted to your exact specifications.

But did you know that daily consumption of chocri could help protect you from heart disease, too? One of the most buzzed about health stories today is good news for chocri lovers, because it turns out that a new German study indicates that eating chocolate every day can lower your risk of heart disease or stroke. Really!

CNN published some data from the study, and the results might surprise you:

Compared with people who rarely ate chocolate (about one bar per month), the people who ate the most chocolate (slightly more than one bar per week) had a 27 percent and 48 percent reduced risk of heart attack and stroke, respectively, the researchers found.

The researchers say dark chocolate, which is packed with antioxidants, offers the highest amount of benefits per bite. (Although milk chocolate has some benefits, too.) And it turns out that with better chocolate quality comes more health perks:

Flavonols are found in cocoa, and dark chocolate contains more cocoa than milk chocolate does.

"The benefits of chocolate come from flavonoids, and those are mainly found in dark chocolate, not Easter eggs, which are usually milk chocolate and have a lot of saturated fat," says Julia Zumpano, a registered clinical dietitian at the Cleveland Clinic, in Ohio.

The experts are quick to point out that chocolate should be consumed in moderation, and that chocolate consumption should be counted toward daily caloric goals. Still, daily consumption of chocolate! Encouraged!

Interested in adding chocolate to your daily health regimen? We suggest the Happy Healthy Bar featuring antioxidant heavy superfood blueberries, ginger, cranberries, almonds, pine nuts and a dark chocolate base; or The Ultimate Nut Bar with hazelnut, macadamia, pecans and walnuts on dark chocolate, both available on our chocri creations page. (All chocri chocolate is organic and fair trade, too!)

If you're feeling creative, you can customize your own healthy chocri bar. Flax seeds and muesli are popular add-ins if you're looking for healthy chocri options. Happy snacking! :)

Who loves chocolate more? Men or Women?

We think no matter if male or female, nine out of ten people love chocolate, and the tenth person lies ;) But really, do women like chocolate more than men?

We asked you! Well, our dear Facebook Fans of which I hope you are one. Here are the poll results:

I think the message is clear: You say women love chocolate more than men.

Turns out you're right, and that there's scientific proof for it:

"Chocolate does affect women differently than men", is what Prof. Auger from UW-Madison says. He, from the field of psychology, studies the difference of female and male brains, and argues that the female's cyclic rise and fall of hormones such as estrogen and progesterone trigger a craving for chocolate (Source). Another reason why women crave chocolate more may be due to its rich magnesium content. Especially during menstruation, women might reach out to their daily dose of chocolate to increase magnesium levels. (Source)

This makes me severely pity men, who are foregoing not only the pleasure of eating chocolate, but also the significant health benefits of eating chocolate. Did you know dark chocolate has more antioxidants than tea? I'm sure you do know though that chocolate makes you happy - are men less happy than women then? In fact, research by the University of Chicago (Source) does confirm that at least until their late 40s, women are happier than men! Must be that women are more prone to dieting in their late 40s... don't skip the chocolate! ;)

Are you a man that isn't afraid to admit that he loves chocolate? Or are you a woman and think that no one can love chocolate quite you do?

[This was posted on Carmen's mass customization blog a few weeks ago]

I would like to make a point here that mass customization increases the value produces in the creation and purchasing process.

Let’s take Spencer, consumer A, and Valerie, consumer B. Spencer loves, loves, loves chocolate with sea salt. Nothing else, just dark chocolate with sea salt. Yummy. Valerie however, dreams of a chocolate bar with salt, bacon and cashews. Let’s pretend for a minute that chocri hasn’t been invented yet. Valerie is out of luck - no such chocolate bar exists!

The picture below describes this situation with more theoretical terms. Spencer pays a certain price for his dark chocolate with sea salt (hint: Lindt makes that, it’s not bad at all), the price covers the producer’s cost and profit. However, to Spencer this is the chocolate bar of his dreams, so he actually gets much more value out of the bar than he pays - so he experiences a so-called “consumer surplus” - think of it as a consumer’s profit.

Value creation of an ordinary mass product

Next to Spencer’s chart is Valerie. Poor Valerie has to do with dark chocolate and salt, when she would much rather have another chocolate bar. She still likes it though, and needs her chocolate. Thus she is still willing to pay the price of the bar, but the value she derives from it is barely above it.

Value of a mass product for different consumers

So, in summary, for Spencer (consumer A), the mass product is just fine, whereas Valerie would get more value out of a chocolate bar that doesn’t exist.

In comes mass customization With chocri for example, everyone gets the chocolate bar of their dreams, everyone gets their needs met like Spencer did, so from an average consumer surplus of itty-bitty (see picture below), the value for the consumer increases

Value created and consumed increases with mass customization. Additional value is distributed on increased costs, profits, and consumer surplus.

In the mass production world, lots and lots of innovation and market research goes towards finding out what most consumers want (to get the “mass” into mass production), but that always means that not everyone is as happy as they could be if they could just create what the really want.

With mass customization, everyone does get what they want. The costs to produce those goods are typically a little higher, but not as much as with old-school customization -there’s still the beauty of a scaling effect. The additional value that mass customization created (see picture) is shared by the suppliers & employees (more business, work, purchases), producer (more profit) and the consumer (more surplus). It’s a win-win-win solution. Or really what it is, is removing inefficiencies in the market. In an ideal world, everyone would be able to purchase exactly what they need and want, and pay the price that corresponds to the value they place on it. Price differentiation is an answer to that, but can’t be applied to everything, and before mass customization, it was just impossible to purchase “exactly” what you want.

Now, I’ll have to be fair - mass customization is still in baby shoes - there aren’t enough players in the market yet to achieve “exactly” what you want. And: We don’t have lavender in our toppings list - choices within mass customization are still somewhat limited. And there’s still Spencer, who couldn’t care less about a salty chocolate bar with peanuts and bacon, since his demand is already fulfilled. But there are many needs that are not perfectly fulfilled, and as the mass customization industry grows and becomes more efficient, this model might soon become the norm. And with the removed inefficiency of unmet needs in a mass production industry, the value created in a market, in a society, in the world - will be increased. Too bad consumption itself doesn’t really make us happy… unless it’s chocolate! :)

Tada, here are the Top 5 Names of this past week:

• Dong! (Dark Chocolate with Peanuts, Cashews, Toasted Hazelnuts, Pecans and Brazil Nut)

• Rainbow Raspberry (Dark Chocolate with Sprinkles and Raspberry)

• Mom's Easter Fun (Dark Chocolate with Blueberries, Roasted Almonds, Organic Flax Seeds, Bourbon Vanilla and Easter bunny with egg in Easter packaging)

• Beyond Basic (Dark Chocolate with Caramel Chocolate Drops and Mini Cookies)

• Tea Time with Mum (Milk Chocolate with Ginger, Pistachios and Cardamom)

What do we learn from them? Well, it doesn't have to be Mother's Day for chocri customers to be thinking about their Moms, which I think is very sweet (but not American chocolate kind of sweet, more like European chocolate kind of sweet).

And that Easter is near! A little secret - you can still order for Easter today, but today is the last day that we think is safe. We are trying to undercut our typical two weeks a little bit, but everything that comes in after today will be subject to the 2 weeks (if you choose standard shipping), so... no square easter eggs. And wouldn't that be sad? :(

Gary Vaynerchuk in three words is Wine, Empathy and BAM!

Wine: Gary Vaynerchuk has a unique (and very fun!) approach to wine. He took the liquor store of his father and turned it into Wine Library, a hugely successful wine business. His unorthodox approach to wine led to him being asked to appear on many TV shows, from Late Night with Conan O'Brien to the Ellen Degeneres Show.

Empathy: But that's not all! Gary is also a New York Times bestselling author with his book "Crush It" that speaks to passion, the social media revolution and business. I was lucky enough to see Gary V's keynote "conversation" (it was mostly Q&A) at South By Southwest, and that's why I picked the word "Empathy" - Gary really gets people. He gets what customers want (that you pay attention to them), and he gets why you and me don't get it, and he explains it for everyone to understand, not just see.

And finally, BAM!: Gary has lots of energy! He is enthusiastic and authentic. He's not shy about who he is and what he wants to say. He captures a room within minutes, and he's (see empathy) kind.

Now that everyone of you know what Gary is about, let me introduce you to his Chocolate Bar:

Gary chose the gold, like a true celebrity, but surprisingly for a wine expert he went for the white chocolate! A delicious bar, with the roasted peanuts, fig bits and bourbon vanilla. This piece of beauty was given out at Gary's #secretwineparty - unbelievable, but he took a huge amount of wine with him to Austin, and gave it out! So I tagged along and gave out chocolate bars. I think people were a little overwhelmed by all the goodness :) It was definitely fun! We had to change location because the line of people outside was so long that it wrapped around the corner and still wouldn't stop (next time you can't get in a club try this line "I'm bringing the chocolate! I have to get in now!" - works wonders. Later in the night, Leo Laporte, Robert Scoble and Kevin Rose came by to hang out and I spoke about chocri for a few seconds on twit.tv, which was pretty cool! And then Robert Scoble tweeted "@chocridotcom, we are eating our chocri bar now and it is awesome!" All in all a successful night!

Here a picture @mager took of the box with the chocolate bars:

Follow Gary on Twitter. Buy his chocolate bar here :). Love it.

*Image Source: Picture of Gary is from here, picture of the bars in a box are from here

p.s. The Top 5 Bar Names of the week later today :)

You're getting it - this week is all about celebrity - excuse me, cewebrity - chocolate bars for South By Southwest! And we still have two very yummy ones to come - the Leah Culver Chocolate Bar and the Gary Vaynerchuk Chocolate Bar.

Ladies first.

Leah Culver is the co-founder of Pownce and software engineer extraordinaire. For SXSW, she created this exciting concoction combining sweet and savory.

I gave those bars away after her panel "Web Framework Battle Royale". Someone was so kind to count: It took mere 60 seconds for all the bars to have vanished! A minute!! Those Web Framework Battlers loved chocolate ;)

Here's the chocolate bar Leah created with chocri:

The bar is, no doubt, adventurous. A combination of dark chocolate, - and sea salt! Ginger, mint leaves and finally gold flakes give this bar a pretty look and exciting taste, only complemented by the black sesame (which, by the way, tastes fantastic). This bar is surely not for everyone - but definitely for those who like salt with their dark chocolate. What can we say - Leah is an adventurous lady, and maybe that's why she got so far in a world dominated by men. We love the bar - and if you do too, feel free to buy it as one of our recommended creations at a price cheaper than if you created it yourself.

Are you the savory or sweet type? Or both? Play with it

We love our Facebook Fans and Twitter Followers. Everyone of you! That's why found a new way to reward you for your support, but it's YOU who determines how much you get:

Facebook

For every tenth Facebook Fan, you receive a coupon value of 2 Cents. Sounds little? It isn't, because the existing Fans are counted as well. So just as of now, the coupon is already worth $6.20 - just by being a Fan! But there could be much more - it increases with every new Fan that joins chocri. Everyone who is a Fan on May 3 (a Monday) counts, and receives the coupon. So tell all your friends! Feel free to use the button "Suggest to friends" just underneath our profile picture to help spread the word. And if you're not already one, become a Fan now!

Twitter

Similarly on Twitter - only that you get an extra bonus: We start off with a base of $5 for everyone. It's still 2 Cents per ten Followers, but we add a little extra. Again, we are counting Followers on May 3rd. You already got $5, but if you want more, start retweeting and telling your Followers about this! And if you're not doing it already: Follow @chocridotcom now!

Dave Morin is an entrepreneur and co-invented the Facebook Platform. In 2009, he was named #16 of the most creative people in business by Fast Company - reason enough to ask him to make his own chocolate bar with chocri for SXSW. Unfortunately he couldn't be there himself, so he asked us to take pictures of the lucky recipients of his chocolate bars - which is how the collage above came about. Look at all the happiness! Thanks Dave for making these fantastic bars (and the Facebook Platform isn't too shabby either, so thanks for that, too...).

By the way, corporate buyers listen up - Dave's Bar is a great example of a logo printed on the bar (instead of the name that you would otherwise give it). Chocolate bars with a logo make a very neat corporate gift, so keep us in mind next time you need something to woo your clients, ok? Thanks!

And here's the bar itself. It's a concoction bringing together dark chocolate, toasted hazelnuts, ground coffee beans and.. gasp.. wonderfully tasty raspberries. Those really rock the bar!

.

Just like the Violet Blue, you can get it as one of our recommended creations for cheaper than if you created it yourself.

But wait, what is on YOUR chocolate bar?

As mentioned earlier, chocri gave out some chocolate bars at South By Southwest Interactive - a half conference, half festival for geeks. One of those bars was created by Violet Blue. Violet Blue is not only a Forbes "Web Celeb", she's an expert in the field of sex and technology and not content with being ordinary. That's why we asked one of Wired's "Faces of Innovation" to design her own bar for SXSW - and she made a very, very sexy chocolate bar.

"The Violet Blue Chocolate Bar" is aphrodisiac-packed, with dark chocolate, roasted almonds, candied lilac (or are they violets?...) and ground coffee.

Here's what Violet herself wrote about it on her very, very sexy blog: "Now I’m about to head down the the Hilton lobby to give out the Chocri chocolate bars I designed, free-Tweetup-flashmob style. Why not? They’re chocolate, almond, coffee and an aphrodisiac surprise. Thank you, Chocri!"

No no, thank you Violet for playing with us! And the good news for everyone is - you can buy the chocolate bar as one of our recommended creations - for a little cheaper than if you'd create it yourself.

Stay tuned for the Leah Culver, Dave Morin and Gary Vaynerchuk Bars for SXSW!

Oops. A little late, but here they come - the best five chocolate bar names invented by our esteemed customers.

• "The Bourbon Hammerhead" (Milk Chocolate with Bourbon Vanilla and Mini Cookies)

• "Orange You Glad I'm Here." (Dark Chocolate with Orange Chocolate Drops, Organic Spelt Flakes, Orange and Easter bunny with egg)

• "Berry Easter!" (Dark Chocolate with Blueberries, Almond Slivers and Writing "Happy Easter" in Easter packaging)

• "Salt-N-Pepa | Spicy Bling Bling" (Dark Chocolate with Coffee, Multicolored Pepper, Fleur de Sel and Real Gold Flakes)

• "[insert clever name here]" (Dark Chocolate with Sour Cherries and Cashews)

As you can tell by these brilliant names, chocri customers are the most creative people ever! The names are really amazing. I always think I found the best of the week - and then there's always one better. For different reasons. You people are so thoughtful and funny - please don't ever stop! And even if you don't give your chocolate bar a name- your chocolate bar itself is creative. Think about it - there are 27 billion different possible combinations (we calculated it, and we'll probably keep saying 10 billion because it both sounds like a whole lot, but 10 billion is easier to imagine)!

Also, I have a great announcement to make! We are hereby introducing

the 5+1 Rule.

Here's what the rule is:
For every 5 bars you create, we add a surprise chocolate bar to your order - for free!
We've been having this rule for a while in Germany and the surprise bars are a great hit. We're not skimpy on them either, but do expect to be surprised - in a very delicious, yummy way :)

Dear friends of customized chocolate bars by chocri,

We have a new topping for you! Check out these little fire crackers:

Sizzle Rocks

You've probably heard about "Pop Rocks" before, right? We're not allowed to use any brand names for our ingredients, but these here are pretty much the same ... only cooler. As soon as they melt with the chocolate on your tongue, they create a fun, fizzy and, well, sizzling reaction, dancing on your taste buds like you did last Saturday night on the dance floor. Add this topping for a little surprise effect in your chocolate bar.

Don't forget to get your orders for Easter in!

Here they come, fun personalization examples:

• BanaRaspTofBritDragee (Milk Chocolate with Hazelnut Brittle, Colorful Chocolate Dragées, Mini Bananas, Toffee and Raspberry)

• MotMot Bday chocolate bar | [Name]'s Chocolate Factory (Milk Chocolate with Strawberry, Blueberries, Roasted Almonds, Organic Flax Seeds and Macadamia Nuts)

• coffee-toffee delight (Dark Chocolate with Coffee, Cinnamon, Toffee and Bourbon Vanilla)

• Mind Blowing (Dark Chocolate with Sour Cherries, Roasted Almonds, Real Gold Flakes, Flower Mix and Pistachios)

• Orange You? (Dark Chocolate with Roasted Almonds, Basil, Organic Flax Seeds and Orange)

What's the name of your chocolate bar?

Dear chocolate & tech lovers,

chocri will be representing at South by Southwest Interactive - with free chocolate!

If you're attending sxsw, we know you'll need a chocolate bar to pick you up at some point. That's why we asked Leah Culver, Gary Vaynerchuk, Violet Blue and Dave Morin to design some bars to be given away at South By Southwest. You can see (and buy) their concoctions on our recommendations page, but better is: Follow us on Twitter to find out where they'll be for free.

Here are some tips:

• We will not give away any today
  

• The bars will probably given away when the creators (Leah, Gary, Violet or Dave) are presenting, so make sure you come to their events
  

• @chocridotcom is the safest way not to miss it, I'm also on foursquare as papillonc, Hot Potato as papillonc and Gowalla as Carmen Magar from chocri, and on Plancast as Carmen from chocri or chocri > You can't miss me :)

Below an example of a bar - the Leah Culver Chocolate Bar:

Doesn't it look delicious?

Friends of delicious chocolate and co-creation, I have good news for you:

Not only do we have a cooler shipping provider from now on, they also allow us to give you a (drumrolls) expedited shipping option! For $13.90 over standard shipping, you can now have your chocolate bars within 7 days from the day you order - that includes us hand-making them, AND shipping them across the Ocean right to your doorstep. Reliably.

What are you waiting for?

As you know, a personalized chocolate bar is a thoughtful, and moreover, unique gift idea. And the next reason to gift family and friends is coming up: Easter!

So we thought up something especially nice: The Easter Box, The Easter Packaging, and some awesome recommended bars especially for Easter:

Easter Box

You can buy this Easter Box readily packed with our Easter creations - Funny Bunny and Eggstravagant. Isn't it cute? The little sheep stays with us, but everything else goes to the lucky recipient of your choice - who may as well be yourself ;)
Check it out

Easter Packaging

Now you can also choose at checkout whether you want your customized chocolate bars delivered in our standard, red packaging, or in our temporary Easter packaging - just check the box when you see your bars listed in the shopping cart (as shown in the picture) and your bars come beautifully enveloped in Easterly fashion.

Recommended Easter Creations

For a quick gifting decision, check out our recommended Easter creations - Funny Bunny, Eggstravagant (a name that was coined on our Facebook Page by our dear Fans Sandra and Jennifer) and Delightful Easter Treat. What's so amazing about them are not only the combination of delicious chocolate with beautifully balanced toppings, but also their price - just for Easter, you can get those bars for an egg-beating $9.90. Meet them here.

Where are you going to hide your chocri chocolate bars?

The second most important day in the year (after National Chocolate Day) is International Women's Day. And that's today!

We are joining in in celebrating women and their contribution to society and life - with quotes and 10% off on chocri orders - only today! We would like to thank you ladies for supporting us right from the start.

Use the coupon code LADIESONLY (only today) at checkout for your 10% off

What will you create?

Also, for your entertainment, here a few funny and inspiring quotes about women:

• I love women. They're the best thing ever created. If they want to be like men and come down to our level, that's fine. ~Mel Gibson

• I hate women because they always know where things are. ~ Voltaire

• If women didn't exist, all the money in the world would have no meaning. ~ Aristotle

• Woman is a miracle of divine contradictions. ~Jules Michelet, French Historian

Contradictions... that makes me think of sweet and savory chocolate bars... ;)

It's Friday People! Good reason for a collection of the most original, wittiest chocolate bars you've made this week... and last week (sorry for the pause last Friday!)

Without further ado, I present you:

• Your Thai-ness
  Milk Chocolate with Ginger, Wasabi Peanuts and Coconut Shavings

• Honeyed Paradise | a foodie's love letter
  Dark Chocolate with Honey Chocolate Drops, Real Gold Flakes, Rice Crispies in Chocolate Coating, Bourbon Vanilla and Paradise Grains

• warm orange crunch
  Milk Chocolate with Cinnamon, Cinnamon Cornflakes, Orange Pepper and Orange

• Pamlicious Delight
  White Chocolate with Candied Rose Petals, Raisins, Cinnamon Cornflakes and Bourbon Vanilla

• Hazelnut Vanilla Coffee
  Dark Chocolate with Coffee, Toasted Hazelnuts and Bourbon Vanilla

Which one is your favorite?

New today in our Spices section, we present you one of the most exquisite - and delicious - salts you can find: Fleur de Sel.

This white “gold” celebrates its comeback with chocri! We source our fleur de sel from Portugal, so strictly speaking it is "Flor de Sal". Both terms mean "Flower of Salt", and this hand-harvested sea salt is one of the most expensive. It is collected by workers in the Atlantic in so-called "salt pans". If you look at a big heap of fleur de sel, it is often slightly grey because of the minerals contained in it. Most importantly though, it will taste fantastic on your chocolate bar.

Due to the small size of the crystals, fleur de sel dissolves faster than regular salt - tingling on your tongue as it melts along with the chocolate.

Try fleur de sel with bacon or peanuts for a savory experience, or pair it with sweet toppings to create an interesting polarization. What's on your chocolate bar?

Hello everyone. Great news! Thanks to your contribution, we can now give our packaging phrases to print, so that soon you will receive chocolate bars with your own packaging phrase in them.

Below are the Top 10 Packaging Phrases you determined:

Michaela wins the $50 coupon, Charnell the $20 gift certificate, and Michaela Number 2 can play with $10 chocri credit. If you want to make sure your chocri order has the new packaging, wait for a blog post on the topic - I'll make sure I'll let you know when we have them set to go.

Thanks everyone for contributing - we had some great ideas and many votes. We at chocri are determined to be and do the best we can, and we can only do that with your help. Thank you!

Recently I received an email from a customer, saying the following: "I read on your site that you appreciate new input on ingredients for your chocolate bars. I think cardamom seeds would be perfect as a spice for your chocolate bars. Perhaps ground seeds would be best, as the taste of whole seeds could be too intense - I can imagine - but I'll let you decide on that."

We couldn't agree more! Cardamom is a wonderful sweet, pungent spice that literally adds some "heat" to your chocolate bar. As pointed out above, it is quite a "loud" spice, which is why we offer it ground so as not to overpower the chocolate and the other toppings. Cardamom is our Spice of the Month, so try it out while it lasts! Find it now in the Spices section when you create your personalized chocolate bar with chocri.

Traded already by the Ancient Greek, cardamom is a very "European" and "Asian" spice. While a lot of cardamom grows in India, hardly any is exported because the people there are so fond of it that they rather use it themselves. Arab cultures were equally excited about the spice, which was considered to have aphrodisiac qualities and was used in love potions.We recommend to pair cardamom with walnuts coffee, date pieces or, for the ultimate Indian chocri bar, with ginger.

What's on your chocolate bar?