'TikTok and Dubai chocolate made our sales boom'

A Kent chocolatier says social media has made their sales soar following the viral trend of "Dubai chocolate".

Ned Vichev, from N2 Sweet Lab in Maidstone, said his shop had seen sales of the pistachio-filled bars go from one or two bars sold a week to hundreds flying off the shelves.

He credited the success to the influence of social media, with one customer coming in to the store and buying 30 bars.

The success comes as supermarket Lidl launched their own take on the delicacy, only for it to sell out within a day.

Mr Vichev told Radio Kent: "We didn't see much interest in the beginning. We were selling maybe one or two per week but now we have weeks where we are selling hundreds.

"In the beginning we didn't realise how popular it was going to be.

"It's a good example of how social media can influence a lot of people."

Dubai chocolate, which saw a boom on sites such as TikTok in recent months, is a chocolate bar filled with pistachio paste and crispy pastry.

One video of the chocolate shared on the social media platform gained over 4.4 million likes and was viewed over 64 million times.

Mr Vichev said that, after selling out in previous weeks, he was now producing it "all the time" in a bid to keep up with demand.

He added that the shop had considered rationing the bars customers could buy following the surge in demand.

Supermarket Waitrose is currently limiting customers to just two bars per purchase due to the hype surrounding the product.

He added that he expected new trends to take over in the near future and that the shop "needs to be in a good position and get ready".

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