Tony’s Chocolonely has been turning up the heat on supermarket copycats this week, as it grabbed the attention of the fmcg world by boldly calling out Morrisons and M&S over their dupes of its chunky chocolate bars.
“It seems colorful, chunky bars are having a moment,” the ethical chocolate brand posted to LinkedIn, accompanied by a graphic featuring its own, instantly recognisable chocolate bars alongside lookalike versions from Morrisons and M&S.
“But if you dupe our design, what about our sourcing model too?” it asked, before calling on the retailers to join Tony’s Open Chain, an initiative which relies on five sourcing principles, including paying farmers a living income. “And together, we’ll end exploitation for millions of cocoa-farming families.”
This isn’t the first time Tony’s has named and shamed a retailer for launching a lookalike version of its chocolate bars. In 2024, it called out Lidl’s Way To Go chocolate bar, which mimicked its irregularly shaped sections without committing to its sourcing principles.
Less gung-ho suppliers might view Tony’s decision to publicly criticise retailers – particularly Morrisons, which lists a swathe of the brand’s 180g bars, plus its seasonal treats – as a risky move. However, standing up for its mission is entirely on brand for Tony’s, reinforcing its commitment to transparency and communicating its value over rivals.
Honesty vs shrinkflation
It’s the second time in as many weeks Tony’s has been making headlines, after it vowed not to shrink or reformulate its chocolate in the face of cocoa inflation. The brand promised consumers its chocolate would stay “exactly the same” in a LinkedIn post, drawing comparisons with competitors whose bars are “getting smaller… or containing less cocoa”.
The statement came after chocolate prices rose by 15% in a year, according to the Office for National Statistics [October 2025], with Tony’s pre-promotional prices up by an average 12.6% across the traditional big four [Assosia 17 November 2024 vs 17 November 2025]. While Tony’s certainly isn’t immune to inflationary pressures, it sets itself apart from its rivals by explaining the rationale behind these price increases to its consumers.
The LinkedIn post went on to say that maintaining its standards, even if that meant raising prices, would be “how we’ll… end child labour on cocoa farms; protect forests in cocoa-growing areas [and] enable cocoa-farming families to earn a living income”.
A similar message was shared in an Instagram post last year, where the brand said: “We need to introduce new prices for our chocolate due to sky-high cocoa prices. It’s not an easy message to share, but we wanna be as transparent as possible. ’Cause honesty is the best policy.”
Tony’s transparency starkly contrasts with category leader Cadbury, which has quietly shrunk a swathe of its treat bags and multipacks over recent months – in addition to pushing through price increases.
In February, Cadbury replaced the old 110g packs of Crunchie Rocks, Twirl Bites, Bitsa Wispa and Oreo Bites with 100g ones. It subsequently shrunk Twirl multipacks of 10 by 10% and Freddo multipacks of five by 20% without reducing the price, quietly replacing them with nine-pack and four-pack alternatives.
Cadbury’s perceived duplicity has left shoppers feeling frustrated, with one shopper branding Freddo multipack shrinkflation as “shameful” in a recent Tesco review. And The Grocer’s upcoming Top Products Survey 2025 will show that Cadbury Dairy Milk’s volume losses are significantly outpacing the category’s declines. (Tony’s, however, are more typical of the wider category.)
So, perhaps shoppers are more open to price increases than changes to their favourite treats – particularly when they know the money is helping to pay farmers a fair wage. As suppliers continue to contend with soaring input costs, other brands would do well to mimic Tony’s transparent communications when sharing their own unique brand value.
Doing so could help them steal share back from own label – especially if Tony’s proves Morrisons’ and M&S’s bars are just style over substance.
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