Frequently Asked Questions

We deliver via Auspost nationwide (excl. the Northern Territory). As our products are temperature sensitive, we highly recommend selecting the express option and having your products delivered to an address where someone can receive the goods personally.

During heat waves, no matter the time of year, if the temperature is consistently above 28°C, with the 'Express Shipping' option, we wrap your chocolate with thermal foil and add ice packs to keep the contents cool. We also keep a close eye on the weather at our location and yours, and may delay dispatching to avoid exposing your chocolate to extreme temperatures.

We will touch base with you if we foresee any major delays! 

We currently dispatch packages on Mondays—Wednesdays to avoid packages sitting in transit over the weekend. You will receive a notification once your package has been shipped.

You can expect to wait 1-2 days for dispatch of items currently in stock. If you've ordered a custom item, please allow extra time for dispatch—turnaround times are listed on each custom product page.

Please note that dispatch times do not include transit time once your package is with Australia Post.

During heatwaves, we may delay dispatch to avoid exposing our chocolate products to extreme temperatures. We will touch base with you if we foresee any major delays!

Being so far from the rest of the world can sometimes make sourcing beans quite tricky—especially at the small scale at which we operate. It makes it harder to sustainably (from both an environmental and financial perspective) import beans from cocoa growing countries like those in South America and Asia. We’ve been focusing our efforts on working with growers closer to home like the Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, Vanuatu and Fiji but will occasionally be lucky enough to get our hands on something further afield through our beautiful network of Australian chocolate makers. 

At Meltdown Artisan, we make our chocolate from scratch. This means taking the cocoa beans that have been expertly grown, fermented and dried at origin and roasting them to bring out their inherent flavour profiles. We then crush the beans and winnow away the outer shell (aka the husk) which leaves us with just the cocoa nibs. It’s a super important step to ensure that the final flavour and texture of the chocolate is just right! We then stone grind these nibs for days at a time with organic raw sugar, and in some cases additional cocoa butter and organic whole milk powder to achieve the smooth consistency that many people have come to know and love of modern chocolate.

The process of bean-to-bar is pretty labour intensive—it requires specialist equipment, a lot of time, knowledge and expertise to do it right. 

But beyond this, we want to make sure that we’re paying above and beyond the stock market price and in many cases better than ‘Fairtrade’ for cocoa. Many farmers are perpetually at the mercy of the fluctuating commodity value, unable to make a proper living wage—which has all kinds of knock on effects. Our chocolate is based on being able to return to the same origins and farmers season on season to provide stability and a guaranteed buyer for their beans.

At present we don’t have any physical stockists, and sell exclusively online. The reason being our margins are small, and wholesaling to retailers would make it incredibly hard to sustain production. We are determined to stay small without compromising our quality or our values.

Unfortunately we don’t run workshops at the moment. While we can definitely educate on the process of bean-to-bar, to get proper hands on practice would required a multi-day experience for which we’re currently not equipped. 

However if you are interested in one-on-one mentoring, please get in touch and we’ll see if it’s possible to accommodate a session.

Always store chocolate in a cool, dry environment away from strong smelling foods and direct exposure to sunlight. Never store chocolate in the fridge, unless it's absolutely necessary, as this can cause sugar bloom (a swirly white appearance on the surface caused by the fats and sugars separating due to condensation), and may impact the texture and overall flavour experience.

Fresh is best! Like all things, our chocolates are best consumed fresh, which is why we also make all of our products in small batches so they don't sit around on the shelves for long periods of time.

Our bonbons have a recommended shelf life of 3-4 weeks, and products like our origin bars and barks approximately 12-24 months depending on storage. Please refer to the best before date on the product packaging.

All of our products are prepared in a kitchen where nuts, dairy, eggs and gluten have been prepared so please use your own discretion when ordering.

We do have a number of products that don't contain added allergens—you can check all of the ingredients out on each product listing in the online shop, or feel free to reach out via our contact form if you're unsure.

We spend a lot of time and care in making and packing your orders so that they make it to you safely. This includes packing with thermal wrap and ice during periods of hot weather. We highly recommend selecting the express post option when checking out, and sending your package to an address where someone will be around to receive, such that it's not left in a hot mailbox or out on a sunny porch for extended periods of time.

If you opt for "Standard Shipping" in Summer or during hot weather, unfortunately we will be unable to replace your order if it is damaged due to heat in transit.

The bottom line is that chocolate still tastes great in whatever format. Popping your items in the fridge for 15 minutes will help to re-solidify them. We do understand though, that sometimes aesthetics matter e.g. for gifting purposes!

If you've followed all of the above and your package still arrives melted, please send us an email with as many photos of the damage as possible and we will do our best to find a satisfactory solution!