Today is our birthday! We've been in the US only for a few months, but chocri as a company is turning two!

2 years ago, chocri was founded by Franz Duge and Michael Bruck in Germany. The world's first company that allows you to design your own chocolate bars - no one had ever done anything like this before!

Below some fun milestones in the "history" of chocri, but before that, we of course want to share our joy with you! That's why today, and today only, we're offering a 20% coupon code! There's only 200 of them - first come, first serve. 20% off your bars, only today, with the code "chocri2" when you enter it at checkout.

Chocri wouldn't be here without you - without you being creative, making your own chocolate bars, and without you recommending us to your friends. We are very, very grateful for that. Thank you.

We look forward to many more awesome years!

A quick history of chocri

April 2008
Franz is desperately looking for a birthday gift for his girlfriend- nothing comes to mind! Last minute, he uses some of the chocolate from his and Michael's chocolate fountain business, melts it and decorates it with gummy bears and trail mix - the first chocri was born. Shortly after, a business idea is born, too

September 2008
After months of preparation, chocri is ready to launch! Franz and Michael are a bit worried - will they sell enough chocolate bars to cover the fixed costs? They need to sell at least 500 bars personalized chocolate bars a month!

Franz and Micha right after they founded chocri. They now look dramatically different today - Franz's hair is a bit more tamed and Micha's about half this size. They will hate me for putting it up! ;)

October 2008
chocri is hustling! A few newspapers covered the story of the two friends, and the young company is flooded with orders. Friends and family are helping to create customized chocolate bars.

December 2008
People love chocri's customized chocolate bars because they are such a unique christmas gift! But chocri can't keep up with demand - they literally "sell out" and don't accept orders online anymore

April 2009
Chocri moves to a new facility to increase production - now three times as big! They now produce about 18,000 customized chocolate bars per month. Also, chocri redesigns its website. It's now much prettier - as you see it today!

June 2009
A German MBA student from U Chicago starts to plan the entry of chocri to the US market. That was me!

September 2009
Chocri win's the Founders Award - one of the most prestigious awards for startups! They receive 300,000 Euro in services from an advertising agency, law firm and others

December 2009
Alas, increasing the production was still not enough - demand has increased even more! Chocri sells out before Christmas, again.

January 2010
Chocri launches in the US! The new website is featured by Thrillist and Self Magazine, Epicurious and many others in the month of the launch

March 2010
Internet celebrities Gary Vaynerchuk, Violet Blue, Leah Culver and Dave Morin make a chocri chocolate bar each for the conference South By Southwest.

April 2010
Chocri introduces a fourth base chocolate. The possibilities explode! There's tens of billions of ways to make your own chocolate bar on the site!

June 2010
Chocri moves again - we now make about 50,000 bars every month, and are beginning to prepare for this year's holiday season - this time we won't sell out early!

July 2010
Customized chocolate bars are now also available in Canada!

August 2010
Chocri's sexy recommendation engine makes it much easier to create your own chocolate bar - based on the analysis of thousand of previous orders, it recommends toppings that pair well with what you've already selected

September 2010
That's today!

Today I share with you a little (big!) update from Germany: We completed our move to a bigger, better location. Chocri has always been very popular, but growth in the last year or so (fueled by our expansion to the US) put our production capacity (and office staff) under so much stress that a move was in order: a bigger chocri!

Not only is our chocolate factory (factory sounds like we have many machines there, which we don't, but you know what I mean) much bigger now (and with that faster), but also the office space which enabled chocri Germany to welcome three new members to the team: Claudi (our new assistant to the CEOs), Björn (our new developer) and Katja (our new representation to the press and media in Germany).

I personally haven't seen it in real life, but will do so this summer, and I'll report what it looks like once chocri has unpacked all the boxes :)

I know that you like to get some insider information here on this blog, and I thought I'd introduce you to the two visionary chocri founders, Micha(el) and Franz. You can read my interviews with them here (Micha) and here (Franz), but here's my quick roundup about them.

Micha and Franz actually met in High School, and discovered soon that they shared something: the entrepreneurial bug. They both grew up not far from Berlin, Germany, and were young kids when the wall fell. Many others in their generation actually left that region of Germany - but not the two of them. Even before graduating from high school, they started their first venture together, and soon they were in the business of chocolate. Well, chocolate fountains and chocolate supplies for those fountains. One day Franz was desperately trying to come up for a great birthday gift for his girlfriend, and faced with lack of alternatives and time, he melted some of the chocolate fountain chocolate and decorated it with his girlfriends favorite toppings - the first chocri was born.

Word got around of this gift, and soon Franz's first buddy asked if he could have such a bar for his mom. Franz and Micha, gifted with lots of entrepreneurial spirit, saw a business opportunity. Personalized chocolate bars might sound like a wonderful, obviously great idea to us now, but keep in mind that back then, in 2008, nothing like this existed! Without any market research on a big scale, Micha and Franz bet on their idea to catch on - and boy, did they hit the nerve of time.

Franz and Micha are currently still in university, but that doesn't keep them from pressing on with chocri - as you all well know, chocri recently expanded to the US, and the UK is next. Germans are known for being quite risk averse, but the two chocri founders have a refreshingly healthy mix of daring new things, but also the amazing ability of constantly coming up with things that people might not have thought about yet themselves, but are enthusiastic about once they exist. Thanks to them, you can always expect chocri to keep innovating, to constantly improve, and to grow.

If you'd like to see Franz and Micha, check out our Youtube Channel for a video with the two.

*What would you like to know about the chocri founders? Comment, and I'll forward the question!

in Germany, people celebrate Christmas on the 24th of December, hence today was the last day for chocri to make customized chocolate bars for the holidays. Yes, that's right - chocri is hard at work until the last day before Christmas!

The very last bar with the wonderful destination of becoming a christmas gift was "Santa's Favorite", a creation recommended by chocri. Here a picture of the last bar being packaged:

An amazing chocolate bar with cinnamon, roasted almonds and toffee, heavily preferred by Santa over the common choice of cookies underneath the Christmas tree. Not only Santa loves it, the whole family does! With it's golden sparkles, it makes for an extra happy Christmas Eve.

Joy, peace and chocolate for everyone!

p.s. If you want to gift someone a customized chocolate bar for the holidays, try out our Facebook application and gift a virtual chocri bar :)