By Marcelo Teixeira
NEW YORK, Feb 17 (Reuters) – The grandson of the man who created the Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup took to social media over the weekend to criticize the popular candy’s manufacturer, The Hershey Company, about alleged changes in the confection’s ingredients.
Brad Reese, grandson of H.B. Reese, published an open letter on his LinkedIn profile complaining to Hershey about the replacement of milk chocolate and peanut butter with cheaper substitutes in the Reese’s line of products. Hershey and the Reese company merged in the 1960s.
Several chocolate companies have changed their products’ formulations in the past two years after cocoa prices hit an all-time high above $12,000 per metric ton in late 2024.
They replaced cocoa butter and cocoa powder with other cheaper, non-cocoa alternatives in some of their products, looking to cut costs.
“My grandfather built Reese’s on a simple, enduring architecture: milk chocolate + peanut butter,” Brad Reese wrote.
“But today, Reese’s identity is being rewritten, not by storytellers, but by formulation decisions that replace milk chocolate with compound coatings and peanut butter with peanut‑butter‑style crèmes across multiple Reese’s products.”
Hershey on Tuesday denied drastic changes to Reese’s formulation: “As we’ve grown and expanded the Reese’s product line, we make product recipe adjustments that allow us to make new shapes, sizes and innovations that Reese’s fans have come to love and ask for, while always protecting the essence of what makes Reese’s unique and special: the perfect combination of chocolate and peanut butter.”
Cocoa prices have fallen more than 70% since the record price due to falling demand and improving supply, as many people cut chocolate buying and companies reduced packages or opted for alternative ingredients.
That led to a complete reversal of the situation. Farmers in the top cocoa-producing countries Ghana and Ivory Coast are now having trouble selling their beans, and are stockpiling them wherever they can.
(Reporting by Marcelo Teixeira; Editing by Ethan Smith)
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