Kerala Brothers Turn 20kg Chocolate Fail Into 7-Tonne Win

When Kuriachan Johnson and his engineer brother Ouseppachan started making chocolate in 2021, they couldn't sell 20 kilograms. Today, their Rakkaudella Chocolates produces seven tonnes of premium single-origin chocolate every month from a factory in Kerala.

The journey started when Kuriachan's Belgian friend Luka Beltrami mentioned that European chocolatiers were sourcing cocoa from Idukki, Kerala, and selling bars labeled "single origin from Idukki" for about ₹1,000 each. Kuriachan, a post-graduate in Economics, wondered why nobody was making this chocolate locally.

"If Idukki is mentioned on the cover, then I wanted to make it here," he says. He invested ₹50-70 lakhs to launch the brand, named Rakkaudella (Finnish for "with love").

The first year was brutal. They wasted ₹1 lakh worth of materials learning the right roasting, conching, and refining techniques. Local bakers rejected their chocolate, saying it wasn't "bitter enough" or "dark enough."

Kuriachan explains that high-quality cocoa beans create fruity, nutty flavors, not bitterness. Their chocolate uses just two ingredients: cocoa and sugar, with no emulsifiers or stabilizers.

The brothers nearly gave up. Their parents, a farmer-business owner father and school teacher mother, kept supporting them emotionally and financially.

Then Mumbai changed everything. The same 70-gram bars that wouldn't sell in Kerala started flying off shelves. "We could not even sell 20 kilograms when we started out," Kuriachan says. "Today we manufacture around seven tonnes monthly."

The Ripple Effect

The success brought vindication in their hometown. The same bakers who rejected them initially came back. Rakkaudella now operates from a larger factory in Kanjirapally with 25 employees and two business partners.

Their store at Pepper House in Fort Kochi stays busy during the Biennale art festival. Customers sample flavors ranging from orange zest to white chocolate matcha to dark chocolate with sea salt. A second location in Panampilly Nagar serves chocolate-based desserts and has 100% customer retention.

The brand even won silver at the International Chocolate Awards. Now they're planning stores in Mumbai, Bengaluru, and Chennai, with dreams of opening in Paris.

"Nobody there does single origin, farm to bar, to the best of my knowledge," Kuriachan says. By year end, they aim to produce 20 tonnes monthly and prove that Kerala's chocolate can compete globally.

What started as a rejected dream now employs 25 people and puts Kerala on the world chocolate map.