Domori

Domori was founded in 1997 by Gianluca Franzoni, an economics graduate who had traveled to Venezuela in 1993 and became captivated by cacao growing there. Starting in 1994, he began working directly with growers and research centers to study and preserve Criollo, the rarest and most delicate of the world's cacao varieties, largely abandoned by industrial chocolate makers in favor of higher-yielding, more disease-resistant beans. That project became the foundation of the company: Domori sources and mills its own cacao rather than buying processed couverture, handling selection, fermentation oversight, roasting, and conching in-house from its base in Turin. Its flagship line is a set of single-origin, single-plantation bars built around named Criollo sources — Chuao, Porcelana, Guasare, and Canoabo among them — each sold at a stated cacao percentage rather than blended into a house style. Beyond bars, the company makes pralines, gift sets, cacao nibs, spreads, and baking chocolate, and runs tasting courses and chocolatier training at its Turin operation. It is structured as an Italian Benefit Company, formalizing sustainability and grower-relationship commitments alongside its commercial activity.