
Mast Brothers: $10 a bar for crappy hipster chocolate (2015) - simonebrunozzi
https://qz.com/571151/the-mast-brothers-fooled-the-world-into-buying-crappy-hipster-chocolate-for-10-a-bar/
======
smacktoward
My BS alarms started going off on these guys when they chartered a _sailing
ship_ to transport cocoa beans to their factory, on the argument that you
could taste the difference between beans shipped by sail and beans shipped on
a ship with an engine (!).

~~~
csours
I only accept chocolate made from cacao pods transported by African Swallows.

~~~
internobody
But then, African Swallows are non-migratory.

~~~
Crosseye_Jack
At least we are not transporting coconuts.

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vortico
This article is a reminder that many luxury goods don't have enough intrinsic
value to account for their price. In those cases, marketing needs to actually
_add_ value to a product, not just inform people of the intrinsic value of a
product. This practice is used in almost all end-consumer products on the
market.

Seeing an Apple ad of a shiny image of a new iPhone imprints that image into
the customers mind, even _after_ they purchase and use the product. Their
perceived value of their iPhone one year after purchase is greater than if
they have not seen any advertisements, because they keep associating the
product in their hands with the very high quality image on TV.

This is what's happening here with Mast Brothers chocolate. The high price
itself can increase perceived value ("If it's expensive, then it must make me
happy!"), appeal to values held by the consumer ("I support small businesses
so I value the purchase more!"), and the packaging or storefront proximity
("Imagine how much value the product is since the packaging is such high
quality, or the presentation on the shelf is high quality"). None of these
have anything to do with the edible substance they're buying (the "end
product").

In fact, I would argue that the end product matters the _least_ for this
particular product. Beyond some point, the quality of product does not affect
its intrinsic value. Mast Brothers is beyond that point. The marketer
therefore must use the above methods to further increase perceived value.

If you are a business owner yourself, you can choose to increase perceived
value of your product in ethical or unethical ways. Some customers will detect
unethical practices, some won't notice (such as people who don't read this
article), and some won't care.

~~~
smacktoward
Or artisanal products like Mast Brothers' are actually Veblen goods (see
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veblen_good](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veblen_good)),
where demand for the product is driven by the high price because it lets its
buyers conspicuously signal that they're better off than everyone else. Poor
people can't afford $12 chocolate bars, so for a person who regularly buys $12
chocolate bars, part of the value to them is the opportunity to demonstrate
how not-poor they are. All the markers of authenticity are just there to let
the buyer convince themselves that they're doing something loftier than that.

~~~
lawnchair_larry
I hear this argument about Apple products constantly, and have a knee-jerk
reaction to debunk it as the actual reason, when it’s more likely motivated by
preference.

I just can’t imagine anyone even thinking that holding expensive chocolate is
going to signal their status, and can’t imagine that anyone is so insecure
that they would even feel a need to. A lot of people buy overpriced items
because they actually believe they are higher quality (whether true or not,
like with wine).

Yet, jewelry and expensive watches exist seemingly only for that purpose, so I
have to call my own assumptions about others behavior into question on this.

~~~
bsder
> I just can’t imagine anyone even thinking that holding expensive chocolate
> is going to signal their status

Really? You can't imagine some hipsters having an "all artisanal" food
gathering? Or a restaurant serving "all artisanal" dessert?

Some people do things because they are genuine. Far more people do things
because they are a fad. Far more do things because it's _profitable_.

~~~
lawnchair_larry
I can easily imagine them doing that, but I have trouble with the assertion
that their reason for doing so is to signal their high status.

The business argument doesn’t apply, I’m talking about the consumer side. Of
course a business would sell something if it’s profitable, regardless of why.

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anthony_romeo
As I read the article, I can't help but feel that the tone is exceptionally
unfair to Mast Brothers.

It seems the primary charge is that 'some, but not all, of their earliest sold
chocolate bars were made from mass-produced chocolate,' referencing bars sold
at a flea market (wherein they allegedly acknowledged to a buyer that some-
but-not-all were made from mass-produced chocolate).

The article then criticizes them for browsing the largest Chocolatier forum on
the Internet for advice... Is this supposed to be a serious criticism?

Then it goes into the quality of the chocolate and alleges that it's
overpriced. I would argue that it's subjective, and there isn't anything
inherently wrong with strong marketing. Maybe their chocolate isn't that good
(I've never heard of Mast before reading this) and they're just convinced it
is?

Finally, the article ends with attacks based on mere speculation and attacks
on the general chocolate industry as a whole.

I'm not making any judgment on Mast Brothers chocolate one way or the other.
It's just that this article has a whole lot of aggressive language propping up
some pretty weak evidence.

~~~
itronitron
Yeah, I found it remarkable that the Mast brothers were rather up front about
the sourcing for each of their chocolate bars. If they have the skills and
dedication then they should be able to improve their product to meet their
marketing.

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dreamcompiler
Stories like this always remind me of the artisanal firewood spoof.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TBb9O-aW4zI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TBb9O-aW4zI)

~~~
neilv
I love that spoof. One big difference is that the artisans in the spoof
appeared to be genuine true-believers, but the investigative articles around
this chocolate story seem to allege intentional deception at some points.

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_1tan
Seeing this article on the frontpage of HN again feels weird.

I am currently going down the deep rabbit-hole of chocolate making and re-read
this just recently. Highly recommend the coverage on dallasfood.org as well:
[http://dallasfood.org/2015/12/mast-brothers-what-lies-
behind...](http://dallasfood.org/2015/12/mast-brothers-what-lies-behind-the-
beards-part-1-tastetexture/)

~~~
simonebrunozzi
Curious: what prompted you to get interested in chocolate making? Anything
interesting and not-obvious you have discovered or learned so far?

~~~
_1tan
1\. It's delicious 2\. It's nutritious 3\. Too many people eat bad chocolate
4\. There lies a very interesting challenge in creating more heat-resistant
chocolate (think climate change) 5\. It's a fragmented, huge market. 6\. I was
looking for a hobby involving manual labour that has the potential to turn
into a company

------
mo1ok
I remember reading about the hysteria of this 4 years ago and wondering if me,
a non-foodie, could actually taste the difference in chocolate quality. I
finally had my first mast brothers bar recently and...

...yeah. It taste like a slightly better quality hershey's bar, definitely not
a $10 bar of chocolate. I was kind of floored, it was actually pretty bad.

~~~
ardit33
same, I tried it once, and thought it was bland..... and kinda crappy/cheap
tasting.

Now that I have been living in NYC for few years, my BS meter has improved.

There are enough tourists and young people that come and go in NYC, and that
propels a whole industry for "expensive/overpriced" but crappy goods and
services. Both Brooklyn and Manhattan are the place of 100$ haircuts, just
because your barber has a hipster beard....

~~~
VRay
Seems like $100 for a haircut isn't that bad when you'd need to pay
$3000/month for a bedroom within an hour's commute, assuming it's a fancy
haircut that takes 40+ minutes

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harryh
Title note: should reflect 2015

~~~
intsunny
Not only 2015, but the qz.com article is blogspam compared to the original
investigation: [http://dallasfood.org/2015/12/mast-brothers-what-lies-
behind...](http://dallasfood.org/2015/12/mast-brothers-what-lies-behind-the-
beards-part-1-tastetexture/)

The Mast Bros situation has been discussed to death, yawn.

~~~
simonebrunozzi
I posted the article here - I wasn't aware of the previous discussion on HN. I
guess there's probably a decent percentage of other HNers that wasn't aware
either.

I also wasn't aware of the dallasfood article either. You raise good points,
but I don't know how I could have acted differently...

------
vr46
Nice to have some light relief and to see that the world outside tech is just
as sketchy as inside. I loved the original expose on Noka, FWIW.

------
mixmastamyk
Interesting they mention Valrhona, which I get at Trader Joe's for 2.99 or so.
It is the smoothest and least bitter 85% chocolate I've found in supermarkets,
and slightly prefer it to both Ghirardelli and Lindt. I didn't know anything
about it until now.

So they started out reselling (remelting) it for 3x the price. Fake it till
you make it, indeed.

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beamatronic
I actually have a favorite chocolate bar that is about $10, made in Hawaii by
Manoa Chocolate [1] They have a factory store in Kailua where you can do a
tasting and they show you how it’s made. They also sell them in some Whole
Foods. No chartered sailing ships as far as I know.

[1] [https://manoachocolate.com](https://manoachocolate.com)

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fnord77
> Mast Brothers have executed a brilliant marketing strategy, but don’t sell
> quality chocolate

can't you say this about almost any high volume popular luxury brand?

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peter_l_downs
Was someone else recently reading Jia Tolentino's essay on modern scams, or is
this just a Baader-meinhoff thing?

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plink
Maybe by Mast Bros’ example there’s opportunity for Elizabeth Holmes to pivot
into this field.

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JoeAltmaier
Old news? Any they've amended their ways.

And the 'crappy' label is a bit harsh?

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oh_sigh
I don't really understand why a 4 year old article about a fake chocolatier is
relevant to this site.

I actually went to their store in Williamsburg before this drama unfolded, and
I remember saying something along the lines to my wife 'Wow, I can't believe
this is their only facility, it looks way too small to pump out so many bars'.

~~~
neilv
It can help us recognize parallels (and differences) in our own industry.

~~~
oh_sigh
I guess so, but a more relevant post might have been an article talking about
the mast brothers fraud, and how it can relate to a tech industry.

But what do I know. Based on the number of comments, readers love this post,
so I was clearly wrong that it was off topic.

