Talking Trade Ep. 49 - Steve Wallace of the Omanhene Cocoa Bean Company

Talking Trade

In the latest episode of “Talking Trade,” Omanhene Cocoa Bean Company President Steve Wallace discusses challenges associated with growing the Milwaukee-based chocolate business.

The company’s products are processed and produced in Ghana, one of the world’s largest producers of cocoa.

“Overcoming history was difficult … the politics and the economics were very much centered on getting things cheaply from this part of the world and making money with it elsewhere,” he said.

Wallace explained his goal for decades has been to “move up the cocoa value chain.” Ghana and the Ivory Coast are the two largest cocoa growers on the planet, but most of the value linked to cocoa and other commodities from the area is added elsewhere such as Europe or the United States, he said.

“So we were disrupting this existing value chain, and there were a lot of parties — both within and without Ghana — that benefited from the old way of doing things,” Wallace said.

State and federal officials in October announced Niche Cocoa of Ghana was partnering with Omanhene to establish its first North American manufacturing facility in the Franklin Business Park. According to the Wisconsin Economic Development Corp., the project represents the largest food and beverage investment by an Africa-based company in U.S. history, and the largest Ghanan foreign direct investment ever made in Wisconsin.

While Wisconsin wasn’t initially a top-of-mind destination for the project, Wallace pitched the Milwaukee area as “the perfect place” for the factory.

“Largely because of our manufacturing expertise — in particular, the food and beverage expertise and ecosystem here — and the very highly trained and capable labor force, and the universities and the agricultural history of this state,” he said.