This year, there’s one local food product that you won’t find under the tree.
High cocoa prices and the price of tin have forced Detroit’s beloved Better Made Snack Foods to forgo making one of its popular holiday chip products this year.
Better Made’s dark and milk chocolate wavy chips in decorative tins are not in markets this season or sold online.
“Due to circumstances beyond our control, we will not be offering our chocolate-covered potato chip tins this year,” Better Made said in an emailed statement to the Free Press earlier this month.
“Unfortunately, significant cost increases with raw materials and packaging components have made the items cost-prohibitive.”
Last June, the Trump administration increased tariffs on steel and aluminum from 25% to 50%.
While cocoa prices are trending downward from 2024 highs, J.P. Morgan Global Research expects “cocoa prices to remain structurally higher for longer.”
Better Made added that it hopes things will improve so that it can “offer them at some point in the future.”
First launched in 2008, the 7-ounce tins of chips have been available around the holidays. They were also an item that you ordered to ship.
Better Made offers many of its other snack food items on its website that you can ship.
New this year are Better Made’s 5-ounce shakers of its spice combinations used to flavor its chips. Four flavors, $8.99 each, are available for a limited time, including Barbecue, Red Hot, Sweet Heat, and Sour Cream and Onion. Buy them online or at Better Made’s snack shop at 10148 Gratiot Ave. in Detroit.
Contact Detroit Free Press food and restaurant writer Susan Selasky and send food and restaurant news and tips to: sselasky@freepress.com. Follow @SusanMariecooks on Twitter. Subscribe to the Free Press. Subscribe to the Eat Drink Freep newsletter for insider scoops on food and dining in metro Detroit.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Better Made chocolate-covered potato chip tins not available in 2025
Reporting by Susan Selasky, Detroit Free Press / Detroit Free Press
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