BBC goes behind the scenes at Nestlé’s Quality Street factory

The production of Quality Street, Nestlé’s famous chocolate assortment, will be the subject of a BBC behind-the-scenes TV program aired tonight and on Wednesday, December 19.

Quality Street has been made at Nestlé’s Halifax factory since 1936 and the BBC were given special access to see how one of the UK’s favourite Christmas treats are made.

Presenter Gregg Wallace will be seen helping unload a tanker with 20 tons of liquid chocolate heated to 50°C (122°F), one of 12 daily deliveries of chocolate from Nestlé’s factory in York where it is made.

The program will show how, in just one hour, 800 kilograms of toffee is cut into precise 10mm x 55mm sticks before disappearing under a chocolate waterfall. Viewers will also see the sweets being packaged and the festive tins of Quality Street being loaded onto the lorry ready to hit supermarket shelves all around the UK.

Nestlé’s Halifax factory produces up to 12 million Quality Street sweets a day in the run up to Christmas and a staggering two million festive tins and more than 13 million Quality Street tubs each year. With 5,500 individual chocolates packaged and dropped into tins every minute.

Talking about his experience from the filming set, Chris Atkinson, communications manager at Nestlé’s Halifax factory, said: “This has been an amazing project from the start to the finish, but nothing could’ve prepared me for the pride I felt watching our people going out of their comfort zone to share the process on film. They were all brilliant and I hope they feel the same when they sit to watch it with their families​.”