The Hershey Company has announced it will return a portion of its confectionery range to traditional chocolate recipes by 2027, ending the use of compound coatings in select products following public criticism from a descendant of the Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup inventor.
The company said it will phase out compound coatings in select Reese’s products, transitioning to traditional milk or dark chocolate by 2027, affecting less than 3 percent of Reese’s items.
The announcement followed an open letter from Brad Reese, grandson of Harry Burnett Reese who created Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, accusing the company of quietly replacing core ingredients across several product lines. Brad Reese expressed disappointment in Hershey’s shift toward compound coatings and peanut-butter-style cremes, a sentiment that gained viral support from consumers who felt the candy no longer tasted the same.
Hershey Chief Executive Officer Kirk Tanner said the decision to return to real chocolate on these products was made shortly after he joined the company in August 2025, before Brad Reese went public with his concerns. The company maintained that the core recipes for its flagship Hershey’s chocolate bars and standard Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups had not changed, with the reformulation applying to items such as mini Reese’s cups, the Reese’s Fast Break bar, and certain foil-wrapped seasonal shapes.
Hershey said it is also enhancing its Kit Kat recipe for a creamier taste and texture and is on track to remove all artificial colours from its products by the end of 2027, backed by a 25 percent increase in research and development funding.
Brad Reese dismissed the company’s announcement, calling it a public relations move and questioning the 2027 timeline, suggesting the company was delaying meaningful action.
The reformulation decision carries market significance beyond branding. It signals that at least one major industrial cocoa buyer is willing to increase real chocolate usage as input prices ease from their historic peaks. Cocoa futures fell sharply through 2025 and into 2026 after briefly exceeding $12,000 per tonne in late 2024, and the return to higher-cocoa formulations by a manufacturer of Hershey’s scale could provide incremental support to cocoa demand at a time when grind volumes remain soft.
Commodity analysts note that if demand destruction caused by last year’s cocoa price spike begins to reverse among major brands, it could tighten the global cocoa balance faster than current supply projections suggest. First-quarter global grind data, due April 16, will offer the first concrete reading of whether industrial demand is stabilising.
