Awards
The US International Chocolate Competition medals will be awarded on a merit basis by a majority vote. The judges will know the category and the price per pound of the products they are tasting. The judges are instructed to grant no awards or medals when, in their opinion, the chocolates are not ones they would import, distribute, buy or sell in their businesses based on product and price category. Judges are asked to evaluate the chocolate in silence until all panel members have finished their evaluation and then open a discussion to reach a consensus. Judge votes are recorded by a USICC staff moderator. If there is a significant difference among the judges’ votes, panelists are encouraged to reach a consensus and, if needed, seek counsel from the Head Judge Lauren Adler.
NO Trade Buyer will be judging their own products or ones they import and or distribute.
Award levels are Double Gold, Gold, Silver, and Bronze.
Judging Panel Information
The judging will be conducted by panels of a minimum of three qualified trade buyers. Our trade-only judging panelists judge for a living and work with chocolate and their customers on a daily basis.
They are a mix of restaurateurs, chocolate mongers, retail chocolate buyers, importers, and distributors. We try to assemble each judging panel with a mix of different disciplines so multiple viewpoints will be considered in the evaluation of the chocolates.
The judges know the category and price of each entry. Evaluations are a consensus decision with the judging panel agreeing to the final medal.
The samples are blind tasted and the trade buyers know the category and the retail price per pound.
Each entry is judged on its own and therefore is not guaranteed to medal. There may be a panel with 2 Gold and 4 Bronzes Winners.
The samples will be delivered to each individual judge’s home or business. After being given several days to blind taste the entries they will then share them with the Head Judge. If there are questions and or major differences in scores then the panel will review the specific samples together.
Additional Information
Open to all commercially produced products from around the world.
All the entries will be properly stored and paneled at a food importer’s warehouse before the competition.
The chocolates will be presented by our staff of chocolate mongers.
The tasting order of entries is set in our database first by panel, then category. Large categories are randomly split by the database so that no panel is asked to taste more than 60 chocolates in the same category.
Chocolates are shipped to the judges with our wrappings and numerical code. No containers are visible to judges at any time until the competition is finished. Staff members are strictly forbidden from discussing any brand names, whether entered or not in the competition.
The decision of the judges is final and no changes are made to awards after the judging is complete.
The trade buyers will also be encouraged to taste entries from other panels after their panel has finished judging.
We encourage camaraderie and sharing of information between the different judging panels.