The Cost Ledger

What does a 50 g chocolate bar really cost?

Start with a transparent example: a 1,000 g batch of two-ingredient, 70% dark chocolate contains 700 g nibs and 300 g sugar. These are hypothetical USD inputs, not supplier quotes or a kitchen-tested production yield. Use “Use 50 g example” above to load the same numbers.

1. Buy enough beans. With an assumed 20% bean-to-nib weight loss, 700 g nibs require 875 g whole beans. At $18/kg, beans cost $15.75. Sugar at $2/kg adds $0.60.
2. Allow for chocolate loss. A separate assumed 5% process loss leaves 950 g finished chocolate, or nineteen 50 g bar equivalents. Ingredients therefore cost $16.35 ÷ 19 = about $0.86 per bar.
3. Count the work and the wrapper. Add $0.60 packaging per bar, one active hour at $20 per batch ($1.05 per bar), and $4 batch overhead ($0.21 per bar). Active work differs from total machine running time; account for machine energy in overhead.
4. Allocate equipment once. An $800 setup spread over 2,500 bars adds $0.32 each. Total modeled cost is about $3.04 per bar, calculated before rounding the line items.

Markup and margin answer different questions

At a hypothetical $6 selling price, the modeled difference is about $2.96. That is approximately 97.1% markup (difference divided by cost) or 49.3% margin (difference divided by price). It is not take-home profit: fees, fulfillment, tax, spoilage beyond your entered losses and other omitted costs still matter.

Use your actual supplier price and recorded saleable output. If you buy nibs, enter their price and set bean-to-nib loss to zero. A partial bar equivalent is a weight allocation, not a promise that you can sell a fraction of a bar. Keep a separate record of rejects, rework and samples.

For formulation, use the Chocolate Lab. For choosing equipment before allocating its cost, see the Melanger Guide and the starter equipment guide. This ledger does not automatically cost milk, added cocoa butter or inclusions.