Visits
Come and visit our brand new chocolate factory in Morlaix, 7 rue du Cosquer, rond point de la Vierge Noire. A gallery is open to the public (free for children under 8 and €3 for adults). You will discover the history of chocolate, testimonials from our teams and our cocoa producers with views of the production workshop. A real him of curiosities and sharing!,
For the greatest chocolate lovers, take part in our Chocolate bars' Lab which allows you to personalize your own bars. Activity recommended from 5 years old. Visit + lab €6.50 for children under 8 and €10 for adults, duration 1 hour minimum.
The building is situated at the lock which opens towards the English Channel and the Atlantic Ocean. This building registered as a maritime public domain is a prestigious setting in the heart of our hometown. Charlotte and Valérie will welcome you and explain the subtleties of our coffees.
Our cargo sailboat will be docked in the port of Saint-Malo, its home port, several months per year and occasionally at other ports around the world. Visits of this unique boat will sometimes be possible, retracing the entire project and the stages of its construction.
Our cargo sailboat
Our Grain de Sail cargo sailboat has been designed to accommodate a maximum of 4 sailors on board. It is above all a cargo sailboat for shipping goods (gourmet goods). We are therefore unable to accommodate additional passengers for our crossings.
During Fall it is better to face a strong depression in the North Atlantic rather than a cyclone in the Caribbean or the Gulf of Mexico. The safety of our sailors is super important to us!
Everything you need to know about our transatlantic crossings
On the contrary! Between New-York city and the Dominican Republic, we ship medical equipment, in partnership with NGO based in the US and in the Caribbean. This recurring partnership has allowed us to ship over 20 pallets of humanitarian supplies on each transatlantic loops!
When we finalized the design of the first Grain de Sail ship in 2016, we were far from imagining that we would be selling more than 330 tons of chocolate by 2021... As a result, we are obliged to import part of our raw materials through conventional means to meet our supply needs. This is also why we started the design of Grain de Sail II as early as September 2020, so that it would be operational by 2023-2024 and could significantly increase our capacity for importing cocoa and green coffee beans (50 meters long with a hold capacity of 350 tons). In 2021, 2022, and 2023, however, we managed to transport more than 50% of our cocoa needs by sail!
For the very first transatlantic voyage, we did not bring back any coffee, but during the second voyage (departure on April 16, 2021 - arrival on July 14, 2021), we brought back 36 tons of cocoa mass and about 800 kg of green coffee beans. For our fifth transatlantic voyage, we departed from Dunkirk in November 2022.
In 2022, we transported around 330 tons of cocoa mass and 60 tons of coffee.
We completed our sixth transatlantic voyage in April 2023 with Grain de Sail I.
2024 marked the beginning of a new era: the commissioning of our second cargo sailboat, Grain de Sail II. It made its first "simple" loop to New York from March 15, 2024, to May 5, 2024, with the holds full of various goods (health, cosmetics, dry food, parapharmacy, wines and spirits, leather goods, engines, industrial parts, etc.). The very first "complete" loop from Saint-Malo to the United States, then to Guadeloupe, and back to Brittany, started on June 15, 2024, and ended on August 16, 2024, in Saint-Malo.
Follow our sailors' adventures on our social media channels (Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn, Twitter, and TikTok).
Our cargo sailboat is required to pass through a port listed as a designated entry point for the importation of organic products into France. Then, the organic cocoa mass will be transported by conventional road transport to Morlaix, and our sailboat will continue its sea journey to Saint-Malo, its home port, unless the goods are directly delivered to Saint-Malo (depending on customs and administrative requirements).
We plan to set up a new chocolate factory in Dunkirk to better meet the growing demands of our customers. This would minimize conventional road transport times to supply various sales points distant from Brittany with which we work.
This decarbonized maritime project takes time, and we are striving, at our level, to provide solutions around sustainable development that are accessible to as many people as possible. Thank you for following our adventures and contributing to them!
Human Resources
Our crew is now complete but, in a few years, we will need sailing enthusiasts to take care of the navigation of our future sailboats. Just a little patience ... But attention: "Merchant Navy" diplomas and certificates are compulsory!
Our capacity is currenlty limited on our premises, but you can surely send us your CV and your cover letter to rh@graindesail.com. Please specify the dates of your internship or apprenticeship. We will do our best to respond to your request as needed. But for the moment we don’t have any vacancies.
Our Human Resources department is there for you. Send us your CV and your cover letter to rh@graindesail.com. But fot the moment we are not actively searching for new talents to complete our crew.
Commercial inquiries
We suggest you to get in touch with our sales department to specify your needs:How much do you need? Which exact product(s) do you want? The timing, etc.?
Grain de Sail is constantly growing. You can discuss your sales projects with our sales department using the contact form available.
Once our production capacity allows it, we may consider selling some of our products without extra packaging material.
Since 2022, Grain de Sail is an Authorized Economic Operator (AEO). This international recognition has allowed Grain de Sail to cement its cargo sailboat transportation operations. We are now able to service the companies willing to decarbonize their exports on commercial routes across the Atlantic and in Europe. To learn more, do not hesitate to visit our webpage about our transportation services or to send us an email at cargo@graindesail.com.
Customer service
Our chocolates have a best-before date of 1 year. Chocolate is a sensitive product requiring optimal storage conditions (neither stored in a humid place nor at too high temperatures) because otherwise this alters the product by separating the cocoa butter from the other ingredients: Fat Blooming. When recrystallizing (changing from liquid to solid) the cocoa butter leaves these white marks.
The chocolate is however perfectly edible and its nutritional values remain unchanged. The taste may however vary somewhat.
Our customer service is available to answer all your questions. Send a picture of the problem, the batch number concerning the product, the place and the date of purchase of your product to service.clients@graindesail.com. You can also fill in our contact form. We will do our best to find a suitable solution.
Applications intended for consumer information are based on the nutritional values of products in order to assign them a rating (bad, mediocre, good, excellent). Chocolate is by nature a product rich in fats and sugars, its two main ingredients. In our chocolate products we strive to find the right balance between cocoa and sugar. We aim preserve the raw ingredient selected only in organic farms and as ethically as possible. Yet chocolate is above all a “pleasure” product and should be consumed in a reasonable way.
Today, we are not yet self-sufficient in the supply of our raw materials. We hope to become one as soon as possible, but it takes time and funds to develop our carbon-free maritime armament. We therefore have to go through so-called conventional transport and our raw materials transported by sail are mixed with other raw materials transported in conventional ways, for the moment. Our consumers contribute every day, with each of their purchases at Grain de Sail, to make this sailing project possible. We are counting on you to move our projects forward!
We currently offer 3 barsfor a basket over €100 : 1 chocolate bar Dark 62% of cocoa, 1 chocolate bar Milk and Coconuts and 1 chocolate bar Milk and Coffee. Then for basket of €201 and more , our customers also benefit from these 3 bars, 1 Grain de Sail metal box, 1 chocolate bar Dark toasted Buckweat and Currant as well as 1 chocolate bar Dark Earl Grey Tea free.
Eco-responsible approach
It is our ambition to create high quality products out of organic resources for an affordable price in the highest possible number. We achieve this with the help f the Grain de Sail teams who produce high quality chocolates and coffees. But also because of our ecological and sustainable approach to low-carbon maritime transport, which allows us to import organic raw materials. Finally, the choice to market our products also in supermarkets responds to a desire to make our coffees and chocolates accessible to the greatest amount of people as possible. Sustainable development, at the heart of the company's strategy, means that our products remain socially accessible.
To answer this question, we invite you to read our vous invitons à consulter eco-reponsible approach