Callebaut in Crisis: The End of a Dynasty? | #PodSaveChocolate Ep 145
Episode 145 of #PodSaveChocolate explores the exodus of top talent at Barry Callebaut and the cratering of the company’s stock price as this industry behemoth struggles. Question: Is the “new” BC a digital dinosaur in the age of mammals? [ Updated on Aug 27 ]
When and Where to Watch
Links below to watch LIVE and to view the archived episode.
Click on this (shareable) link to watch on YouTube. Please subscribe (free!) to the @PodSaveChocolate YouTube channel, like this video, comment, and share this episode to help grow the #PSC community.
Watch and comment LIVE or view the archived episode on LinkedIn. Join my network on LinkedIn to receive notifications and to refer business to each other.
Watch and comment LIVE or view the archived episode on TheChocolateLife page on Facebook (for 30 days, then watch the archive on YouTube).
Follow TheChocolateLife on Facebook to receive notifications and catch up on other content.
Episode 145 Overview
A recent article (dated August 20th, 2025) posted on IN$IDE PARADEPLATZ (original in German and the website sets over 200(!) tracking cookies so I am not going to link to it) has the following translated headline and subhead:
CEO Provokes Mass Exodus of Top Talent
The chocolate multinational, controlled by the Jacobs billionaires, has turned into a crisis-ridden company. The blame: CEO Peter Feld.
What do critics postulate as the Feldian root cause of the decline?
BC Next Level.
BC Next Level posits three axioms at the heart of a major restructuring of the company’s operations designed to lead to profitability.
- “Simplify Barry Callebaut”
- “Significantly advance digitalization across the Group” and
- “Put the business closer to our customers and markets.”
To achieve these goals, BC management, under the direction of Feld, is hiring hundreds of specialists in digital and strategic roles while reducing the number of tenured staff and streamlining management layers. This has led, according to the IN$IDE PARADEPLATZ article, to what is characterized as a “major leadership crisis.”
“Feld has driven away or ousted over 80 percent of Barry’s long-serving managers, says one insider. Among them are many veterans with 25 years or more of experience and company loyalty.”
The questions are:
- Will BC survive? and if so,
- What will the company look like in five years? Ten?
A Short History of BC
Barry Callebaut AG is today the world’s largest business-to-business cocoa processor and chocolate manufacturer. The company’s lineage stretches back almost two centuries on two different European frontiers.
Recent CEOs
- Peter Feld: April 2023 – present
- Peter Boone: September 2021 – April 2023 (~2 years)
- Antoine de Saint-Affrique: October 2015 – September 2021 (~6 years)
- Juergen Steinemann: 2009 – September 2015 (~6 years)
- Patrick De Maeseneire: June 2002 – August 2009 (~7 years)
In my role as a journalist, I met both Antoine de Saint-Affrique and Peter Boone in person at global product launch events (Saint-Affrique at the launch of Ruby in Shanghai, 2017; Hidden Persuaders in Cocoa and Chocolate at ISM in Köln, 2018; Wholefruit Chocolate in San Francisco, 2019; and Boone at the 2nd Generation Chocolate in Venice, 2022.) I also met Peter Boone at various events during his tensure as President of BC Americas.
Who is Peter Feld?
A mechanical engineer by schooling, Feld began at Procter & Gamble in 1992 and went on to senior roles at Johnson & Johnson and Beiersdorf. He is known for leading troubled consumer-goods and equipment companies back to growth through tight cost controls, sharper brand focus, and accelerated digitalization.
The leveraged buyout firm KKR (Kohlberg Kravis Roberts) hired (2013-2016) him to restore WMF, a manufacturer of automatic coffee machines. From 2017-2022 he was at GfK, a provider of market research services, where he engineered the merger with NielsenIQ in 2022.
So, of course, Feld has no specific experience working in cocoa and chocolate, making him a perfect choice for CEO.
And that may be the actual root cause of the decline.
The Takeaways
That’s what I’m going to be exploring in the rest of the episode:
- Is the current crisis existential?
- What outside influences are/were outside of the company’s control?
- Are “advancing digitalization” and “putting the business closer to their customers” contradictory given the changing nature of the cocoa landscape?
Observations
At the publisher of a website with over 1600 posts, it’s nice to see that the BC comms team can make basic editorial mistakes that endure for years. Shades of schadenfreude?
On the Barry Callebaut History page, in the Important milestones in the Barry Callebaut Group's history, for 2022 section, the same page is linked to twice under the headlines:
- Barry Callebaut introduces the second generation of chocolate
- Barry Callebaut introduces second generation chocolate, redesigning cocoa bean farming, fermentation and roasting to meet changing consumer preferences
The video on the page may be a little interesting in the sense that you might get an inkling of just how expensive these launch events were. (And if you watch closely, you will see me at least twice.)
Questions?
If you have questions or want to comment, you can do so during the episode or, if you are a ChocolateLife member, you can add them in the Comments below at any time.
Episode Hashtags and Socials
#BarryCallebaut
#chocolate #chocolat #specialtychocolate #craftchocolate #beantobarchocolate
#cocoa #cacao #cacau
#PodSaveChoc #PSC
#LaVidaCocoa #TheChocolateLife
Future Episodes
#PodSaveChocolate and #TheChocolateLifeLIVE Archives
To read an archived post and find the links to watch archived episodes, click on one of the bookmark cards, below.
Clay Gordon
Clay Gordon
Audio-only podcasts
Become a Premium ChocolateLife Member!
| These offers are available to free members, so subscribe above then click one of the following links. | |
|---|---|
| Team TCL Member Monthly membership | First 2 months FREE (save $10/yr) |
| Team TCL Leader Monthly membership | First 2 months FREE (save $30/yr) |