Chocflation: Easter eggs are getting smaller and more expensive as costs soar

Easter eggs from big brands such as Cadbury, Mars and Terry’s are getting more expensive, with some eggs increasing in price by up to 50 per cent while shrinking in size.

Consumer website Which? found that some Easter eggs went up by as much as 56 per cent per 100 grams, year on year.

In one instance, an 80g pouch of Terry’s chocolate orange mini eggs from Lidl not only rose in price from 99p to £1.35 in one year, the package size shrank to 70g. The price rose by 56 per cent per 100g.

Which? said that products have also shrunk at other supermarkets, but the price rise per 100g was less. Asda saw a 51 per cent rise, while Sainsbury’s marked 37 per cent and Tesco 14 per cent.

At Tesco, a Twix white chocolate Easter egg had increased from £5 to £6 in the run up to Easter year on year, but shrunk from 316g to 258g. The unit price had gone up by 47 per cent.

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Meanwhile, a Cadbury’s Creme Egg Five Pack Mixed Chocolate Box at 200g, sold at Morrison’s, rose from £2.62 in the run up to Easter 2024 to £4 this year. While the package size remained the same, the price had increased by 53 per cent per 100g.

Some of the biggest examples of inflation occurred in non-Easter chocolate, including the supermarket’s budget own-brand products. Sainsbury’s Stamford Street Co. Milk Chocolate 100g went up from an average 50p to an average £1.03 – over 100 per cent year-on-year.

Asda similarly saw a 73 per cent increase in its Fruit & Nut Milk Chocolate 200g, as it went from £1.33 to £2.30.

This comes as the price of chocolate has soared by 16.5 per cent in a year, while other supermarket food and drink has risen by 4.4 per cent, according to the Which? Supermarket food and drink inflation tracker.

A drastic fall in global cocoa production has driven up the wholesale costs to record highs, which means the sweet treat faces a steeper rate of inflation compared to other food and drink.

Chocolates aren’t the only thing impacted by the cocoa production crisis, as Which? found that inflation on biscuits as a category was up by 8.5 per cent. Chocolate biscuits in particular were found to have higher rates of inflation, which suggested the prices were impacted by high wholesale costs on cocoa.

At Ocado, Daylesford Organic White Chocolate Dipped Lemon Biscuits 150g went up a staggering 83 per cent year-on-year from £4.10 to £7.50.

Meanwhile at Waitrose, Bahlsen Ohne Gleichen Milk Praline Wafer 125g saw a 64 per cent year-on-year increase from £1.59 to £2.60.

More generally, Waitrose had the lowest rate of year-on-year inflation at 1.8 per cent when compared to other supermarkets on the food and drink products included in Which?’s tracker.

Sainsbury’s had the highest inflation, with prices up by an average of 5.6 per cent, with Tesco not far behind as inflation it 5.3 per cent.