Specialty Cocoa And Chocolate Associates

Who we are

Discover the powerhouse behind SCCA

We are an alliance of independent consultants and cocoa-chocolate industry experts with 60+ years of experience working across the cocoa value chain.

Led by Bill Guyton and Kristy Leissle, PhD, we work with clients such as farms and multinational companies, as well as with traders, processors, trade associations, and development partners. We have a robust network and demonstrated project success across the full value chain.

EXPLORE OUR PROJECTS

Pioneers in Cocoa Excellence

Meet our founders

Dr. Kristy Leissle

Dr. Kristy Leissle is an internationally recognized expert in the cocoa and chocolate trade, with twenty years of experience as a cocoa field researcher in Africa. She specializes in educational and research consulting to cocoa and chocolate companies and trade associations, as well as marketing and business development for African cocoa producer organizations.

Kristy is the Founder & CEO of African Cocoa Marketplace, Inc., and Co-founder of the Cocoapreneurship Institute of Ghana. She is the author of the series “I am a cocoa farmer” for Confectionery News and the book Cocoa on Geopolitics.

Bill Guyton

Bill Guyton is a senior-level leader within international agribusiness and non-profit organizations who is committed to global sustainability best practices. He specializes in creating public-private partnerships and developing resilient value chains and community-based programs.

Previously Founder and CEO of the World Cocoa Foundation, Bill has worked since 2018 with the Fine Chocolate Industry Association. First as Executive Director and then as Senior Advisor. His career has included assignments in Africa, Southeast Asia, Latin America, and the Middle East, where he managed development programs for the public and private sectors.

Navigating Cocoa Solutions

Consultants

Brett Beach

Brett Beach brings six years of development experience in Africa – including the U.S. State Department and USAID – and more than 15 years of FMCG business leadership in the U.S. and Europe. Co-founder and executive director of two ethical chocolate brands, MIA and Madécasse / Beyond Good, Brett has been involved in every aspect of the product journey from farm to market.

Brett gained an in-depth understanding of market dynamics by bringing more than 20 products from production in Africa to launch at trade shows and retailers: independents, Amazon, and national grocers Whole Foods Market, Waitrose, and Sainsbury’s.

Anya Carrasco

Anya Carrasco is a project manager with over a decade of experience increasing operational efficiencies to drive productivity across the agricultural, education, and technology sectors. She heads U.S. operations at Zorzal Cacao and oversees Cocoa Masterclass Dominican Republic logistics.

Anya holds a master’s in sustainability from Harvard with certificates in food systems and innovation and is committed to shaping change around circularity, energy efficiency, and waste. She is the board secretary of Inin Rabi, which partners with indigenous peoples of the Amazon on food security and the preservation of traditional ecological knowledge. Anya is trilingual (English, Spanish, Brazilian Portuguese) and has facilitated educational exchange programs in four Latin American countries.

Colin Ulbert

Colin Ulbert combines experience in creative leadership and social media advertising with a deep understanding of growth strategies. Currently a Creative Lead and Social Media Ads Specialist at Dutch agency Leapforce, Colin has spearheaded numerous digital marketing initiatives, leveraging modern tools to drive visibility and growth.

Colin merges his marketing expertise with a passion for sustainability through Truly Creative. He plays an essential role as a social media consultant to the TSIRO Alliance in Madagascar, working alongside USAID, Catholic Relief Services, and the FCIA. Previously, Colin earned his stripes as marketing manager of Chocoa, gaining deep insights into the cocoa and chocolate industry.

Isabelle van Lier

Isabelle van Lier, founder of IVL Creatives, has been helping businesses grow their brands on social media through content marketing since before TikTok was a thing. She recognized the common challenge of businesses overcomplicating their messaging and founded IVL Creatives to simplify and amplify their impact.

With projects spanning international trade and development, sustainable tech, and the coffee and cocoa sectors, Isabelle has consistently delivered social media marketing services to inspire positive change worldwide.

Driving Positive Change

What we do

Technical

Educational

Marketing

We provide technical, educational, and marketing services to companies, organizations, and development partners in the specialty chocolate ecosystem. We support our clients in analyzing, measuring, and scaling their sustainability and development impact, and we assist companies in planning and building strategic partnerships. We specialize in Africa and have capabilities in the Latin America and Asia cocoa markets.

Our Process

Maximizing impact through strategic collaboration

We use a unique three-stage process to assess, enhance, and market your sustainability strategy.

Analyze your sustainability approach and metrics through a review of documentation, calls with client leads, and interviews with key staff and suppliers.
Deliver results of sustainability assessment, including strengths, gaps, and opportunities for growth, in a virtual workshop and final report, including recommendations for Stage 2: Implementation.

Based on recommendations from Stage 1, we develop and implement a plan for enhancing your sustainability impact. This may include developing partnerships with donor agencies, cultivating new sourcing options, supporting a new program outcome, and developing metrics to assess impact.

Now that you have implemented your refreshed sustainability strategy, it’s time to make it visible. We help you identify your target audience (for example, consumers, supply chain partners, and development agencies) and then design a marketing program to get your sustainability achievements in front of that audience.
Sample marketing tools: industry-focused webinars, social media marketing campaigns, sustainability or transparency report writing, bespoke thought leadership “portals,” or other digital marketing innovations.

The SCCA difference: a conceptual bridge across the value chain

As external consultants with deep knowledge of cocoa value chains, we provide fresh analytical insight into your sustainability approach. We offer a suite of tools and programmatic options to demonstrate your company’s or organization’s thought leadership and positive impact.

Building on your existing successes, we develop technical, marketing, and educational capacity within your company or organization to enhance and magnify the impact on the most vulnerable actors in your value chains.

For projects of appropriate scale, we build and manage public-private partnerships to leverage the resources of development partners and private sector actors. These partnerships ensure meaningful programmatic scale and scope and measurable impact.

Maximizing impact through strategic collaboration

Unique benefits of working with SCCA

We speak the different “languages” of stakeholders across the specialty cocoa ecosystem. We are highly effective communicators with actors from every part of the cocoa value chain, from cocoa farmers to multinational companies and bilateral development agencies.
During research stages, we use a proprietary listening-based approach that centers on the perspective, context, and priorities of each stakeholder. This helps us particularly when working with vulnerable groups.
We work with your company or organization, as well as with your suppliers, to gain 360 insight into your sustainability approach.
We offer economies of scale to development partners and private sector actors. Value to development partners: We support you in enhancing your sustainability approach and then work with private sector actors to adopt and implement your approach. Value to companies: You do not need a full-time sustainability staff. We work with your existing staff to enhance and expand your development and impact capacity.

Strengthening specialty value chains

Discover the powerhouse behind SCCA