A Bittersweet End for Le Furet Tanrade, the Oldest Confiserie in Paris?

Le Furet Tanrade isn’t quite like any other chocolaterie in Paris. While most look like jewelry shops, their windows showcasing an assortment of identical bonbons and bars, at this shop in the 10th, a colorful, hand-painted sign and a jovial ferret mascot pave the way for a discovery of rusticity. No two mendiants look quite alike; the éclairs, considered by some to be Paris’ best, are pleasantly uneven, obviously hand-made – almost purposefully so. And that’s exactly how Alain Furet likes it. 

“We make our own florentins,” he says, noting that most chocolate shops get theirs from a company “that makes florentins for everyone. It’s true – they’re perfect. They’re tiny. They’re impeccable.” 

On the contrary, Furet prides himself on making everything in-house, from hand-rolled truffles to slow-candied orange peel for his orangettes. 

“That’s true luxury,” he says. “False luxury is made abroad. You stick a brand on it, and that’s it; it sells.” 

His passion for chocolate started 52 years ago, when, at the tender age of 13, he began working as a chocolatier. His path led him to work at some of Paris’ top luxury confiseries, including Lenôtre and Boissier, before he finally set up his own shop in the late 80s, where he broke with pre-established norms. 

“We worked in front of the clients,” he recalls. And while he admits that the first two years were slow-going, this transparency and authenticity may well have been what attracted the attention of one Monsieur Tanrade, the last living heir to his family’s artisanal jam-making company. Founded in 1728, Tanrade was beloved by such famous names as Honoré de Balzac, Marcel Proust, and Johnny Hallyday. In 1990, Furet recalls, Tanrade suggested that jam-making could be a good complement to his chocolate business. “Once Easter is over, fruits come in,” he recalls Tanrade telling him. “And then you can make jam.” 

And so he did. The newly christened Le Furet Tanrade soon specialized not just in chocolates but in top-notch jams made only with fresh, seasonal fruits. In 2002, Furet’s dedication to his new craft even earned him the distinction of Meilleur confiturier de France.  

But despite this prestigious background, Le Furet Tanrade has long flown under the radar. 

“No one really knows me,” admits Furet. “I’ve only been on social media since December. It’s not really my cup of tea. Though it’s true it’s the future.” 

That said, for Furet, there may not be much of a future. After a series of unfortunate events, the oldest confiserie in Paris may be shuttering its doors – for good. Since April 24, the doors to Furet’s shop have been locked, due to ongoing cashflow problems that contributed to 36,000 euros in debt.  

This is not the first time Furet’s shop has been threatened. He nearly lost his business in the early 2000s due to similar cashflow issues, and in 2011, his original store on the still-same rue de Chabrol burned down due to a neighbor’s deep-frying mishap. “150 firefighters had to put it out,” he recalls. And while he was insured for 750,000 euros, the timing couldn’t have been worse. “Easter was in three weeks,” he says. “And what you need to know about chocolate is that it’s 40% at Christmas and 30 at Easter.” 

But Furet has long been creative in his fight to maintain his business. “I made a video, which was in le Parisien,” he says. “I got a big cauldron, and I got into it, buck naked. I mean, I hid my genitals with a cocoa pod.” 

It certainly got the public’s attention, paving the way for an offer: a smaller shop on rue de la Messagerie, a collaboration with locavore food distribution organization La Ruche Qui Dit Oui. And one day, as he was walking down his old street, “by chance,” he says, “there was this guy who had a restaurant here, and it wasn’t really working, some organic thing,” he recalls. “And kind of laughing, I said, ‘Is it for sale?’” 

But once again, timing was not in Furet’s favor. The rise of widespread transport strikes, the yellow jackets movement, and the outbreak of the pandemic contributed to even more difficulties, and while thanks to la Ruche Qui Dit Oui, he managed to eke out some work during Covid-fueled confinements, the 40% overheads of the partnership, coupled with a lack of aid from the government due to the change to his company’s structure so soon before the outbreak of the pandemic, meant that Furet’s income was threatened. Compounded with surging cacao prices, which have increased a whopping 85% since the beginning of the year, he stopped being able to manage his rent payments. And then this spring, just before the May holidays, disaster struck once more. 

“Someone called me and said, ‘Monsieur Furet, the repo woman is here to kick you out,’” he recalls. “I was in Clignancourt, and the lady says to me, ‘I’m leaving in 15 minutes.’ I got here in 12.” 

He begged and pleaded; she threatened to change the locks. And while he’s launched a call for donations and even gone so far as to appeal to the mayor, so far, nothing has changed. “There were 15,000 euros worth of merchandise in the shop,” he says. 

His, he says, is an endemic problem, affecting many small artisan shops in Paris. “We get no help. No one gets any help, except chains,” he says. “I’m at the end of my rope.” 

In addition to outstanding rent payments, he says, he owes his son several months of his salary. At this point, after 37 years in the 10th arrondissement – and nearly 300 years of history – this may be the end for le Furet Tanrade. 

For someone not so values-driven, the fix could be an easy one. The longevity of his brand has led many big businesses to offer a compromise: a cashflow injection in exchange for use of the name, a compromise, he says, that would lead to the end of the artisan quality of his craft. 

“They won’t be making anything,” he says. “They’re just going to market it. Buy things left, right and center, put the name on it, and voila. Like so many do these days.” 

He’d rather go under. 

“I’ll go,” he says, of the end of his business, if it comes. “But I want people to know it – to know why and how.”  

Still, he hasn’t lost hope. He believes in the values of the younger generation, who, he says, look for the sort of authentic products he produces – and believe in the longevity of businesses such as his. “That’s how the brand has stuck around for 296 years,” he says. “It’s because it was never tarnished.”