Japanese confectioner, Ezaki Glico Co. has recently inaugurated its largest-ever factory for its mainstay ‘Pocky’ chocolate snack in Indonesia, aiming to supply to the growing demand from domestic market as well as from neighbouring Southeast Asia and North American markets.
According to a company spokesperson, Indonesia will be Glico’s ‘new growth engine’ due to its massive population and a rising middle class. The Pocky plant in Karawang in West Java, near Jakarta, has a total floor space of about 57,000 sq.meters, surpassing Glico’s previous largest factory located in Japan’s western city of Kobe. It will also be Glico’s 2nd factory in the region after the one in Thailand.
The Indonesian factory, operating under PT Glico Manufacturing Indonesia, has already started supplying the domestic market, and is planning to start exporting products to North America later this year. The factory will solely produce Glico’s flagship product, Pocky, which is a chocolate-coated biscuit stick that comes in several flavors such as strawberry and matcha.
The high-technology factory was built with an investment of US$45 million and employs up to 250 workers.
Pocky was rolled out in Japan in 1966 as ‘the world’s first chocolate coated biscuit sticks’ with an innovative idea of leaving one end of the stick uncovered so that no chocolate gets on the fingers.
Japan-based Glico Group reported sales of US$1.46 billion in 2022.
