World Confectionery Conference welcomes Sweetdreams finalising speaker positions
Yorkshire's Harrogate in the UK is the setting for this year's World Confectionery Conference. Pic: Clive Varley
With a little over three months to go, it’s fantastic news that our World Confectionery Conference speaker line-up has been completed with the welcome addition of Sweetdreams confectionery, ensuring the UK gains some balanced representation for this year’s event.
The company is certainly to be commended for its pattern of growth that has been witnessed with its founding Choc Nibbles brand of treats, that has since gone on to be recently augmented with a new bar format that has taken the brand on to the next level. Its subsequent recently announced move into forging an entirely new premium chocolate range, Gozo, is already causing something of a stir, and its a story that you won’t want to miss out on hearing at our event on 5 October at the Harrogate Convention Centre in Yorkshire, UK.
In an ever-shifting market, gaining the inside track on latest trends is particularly important, with FMCG Gurus’ senior specialist Mike Hughes set to offer some valuable analysis on where the confectionery market, including chocolate segments are heading in 2023.
These key businesses joins a notably strong series of presentations from right across the confectionery spectrum – from our opening address by Mondelez International’s Barbara Blohberger, speaking in her capacity of vice president of Caobisco European trade body for confectionery, biscuits and chocolate, to keynotes from the likes of Nestle cocoa ingredient advisor John Newell), Cargill sustainability specialist Waleed Nasir, senior supply chain policy specialist Francesco Tramontin of Ferrero and Surmaya Talyarkhan of Fairtrade to kick-start a broad range of discussions.
They will be joined by York Cocoa House’s Sophie Jewett, who will be lending her considerable knowledge as a chocolatier to the event, as well as leading a special chocolate making activity day in neighbouring York on 6 October as well, which we encourage as many of you as possible to jump on board with. There’s never any point in time when you can’t pick up new skills, and that’s something that I’m personally keen to engage with too.
The ingredients and equipment side of our industry is also well represented, with MacIntyre chocolate systems offering a keynote presentation on its well-established ranges, as well as contributions from Baker Perkins, Rousselot, Cama Packaging, GNT, Farmforce and Ghana Cocoa Board, plus the return of our Q&A sessions putting sustainability well and truly under the microscope for good measure. So here’s hoping that as many of you out there as possible now feel inspired to sign up to the event.
While there may well indeed be many options out there in the global events space, we believe we’ve put in a considerable effort to deliver a package of sessions, as well as an additional activity day to ensure this will be an especially memorable occasion that builds on the momentum of our last two years. Your attendance really is valued, so please don’t delay in getting your name on our list! Look out for more detail in our upcoming July/August edition of the magazine.
Neill Barston, editor, Confectionery Production
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