CHOCOHOLICS avoided novelty chocolates, this Christmas according to the boss of Hotel Chocolat.

Hazelnuts, pistachios, peanut butter and pecan-based chocolates were hugely popular over the festive period, with customers also looking to trade up to bigger boxes of chocolates as families celebrated.

Angus Thirlwell, the retailer’s chief executive, told the PA news agency: "People are looking for true flavours. We’re seeing that there’s a lot of interest in things not strained towards novelty.

“I think that’s due to a lot of people rebasing their outlook and values because of the pandemic and different things are more important to us now.”

Mr Thirlwell’s comments come as the company, which has a branch in Bolton Market Place, revealed sales jumped 37 per cent in the 13 weeks to December 26 compared with a year ago, including a 38 per cent rise in the UK.

The company saw a shift from store to online sales as the Omicron Covid-19 variant spread throughout the country in December but sales held up strongly, he added.

The boss said: “It was still a tricky Christmas. There were new Covid variants, there was the pingdemic, there were forklift truck driver shortages, but we managed to dance our way through that.”

The company started training its own forklift truck drivers in-house and drafted in staff from different sites to fill shortfalls.

A handful of stores needed to close due to staff illness but these were only temporary.