Chocolate giant Barry Callebaut taps ex-Unilever boss as CEO

The company said its current CEO Peter Feld would leave his role on January 26 “to pursue other career opportunities”, Reuters reports.

One of the world’s top cocoa processors, which supplies chocolate for Magnum ice creams and Nestle’s KitKat bars, said its sales volumes fell 9.9% to 509,401 tonnes in its first quarter that runs from September to November.

Analysts were expecting 512,000 tonnes on average in a company-provided poll.

It also confirmed its outlook for the current financial year.

Industry Relationships

The change of leadership at the Swiss cocoa processor is the latest of several at the top of leading consumer companies over the last 18 months.

“The appointment of Hein Schumacher lands like a small bombshell,” Vontobel’s analysts say.

The incoming chief executive Schumacher, a Dutch national ousted by Unilever in February 2025, will benefit from already having deep industry relationships with Barry’s key customers, they added.

Feld began his role as CEO in April 2023 and has steered the company through high cocoa prices, to which Barry is more exposed than consumer-facing firms, and a subsequent fall in demand.

The latest Q4 data on cocoa grind, a proxy for chocolate demand, showed a slump in Asia and fell 8.3% year on year in Europe, which represents roughly two-fifths of Barry’s revenue.

Barry buys cocoa beans that it processes into cocoa butter and powder. Manufacturers then use its product to produce chocolate and candy which is sold to consumers directly.

After three cuts to the company’s volume guidance last year, in November it guided for a mid single-digit percentage decline in sales of cocoa products in 2025/26.