Toblerone, the Swiss chocolate bar, is set to remove the image of the Matterhorn mountain peak from its packaging when some of its production moves from Switzerland to Slovakia.
US company Mondelez, Toblerone’s maker, said that the chocolate bar will undergo a revamp of its labeling and feature its founder’s signature instead.
The 4,478m (14,692 ft) mountain will be replaced by a more generic summit. The reason behind the change is the strict rules surrounding “Swissness” since 2017, which state that national symbols cannot be used to promote milk-based products that are not made exclusively in Switzerland, with the threshold for other raw foodstuffs set at 80%.
Mondelez said that it is relocating some of the chocolate’s production outside of Switzerland to meet the increasing worldwide demand and to expand the Toblerone brand in the future.
The new packaging will showcase a “distinctive new Toblerone typeface and logo,” said Mondelez. The inspiration will come from the Toblerone archives, and the packaging will feature Tobler’s signature.
The first pyramid-shaped Toblerone, made from Swiss milk with honey and almond nougat, was introduced in Bern, Switzerland in 1908.
The chocolate’s packaging has featured the jagged silhouette of the Matterhorn since 1970. Prior to this, the Bernese bear and eagle were the packaging symbols, according to the Toblerone website. Mondelez added that Bern remains an “important part of our history and will continue to be so for the future.”
Toblerone sparked controversy in 2016 when it changed the chocolate bar’s design to space out the distinctive triangular chunks in an effort to reduce costs.
However, after facing severe criticism, the company reverted back to the original shape two years later.
