Hershey Chocolate Factory Tour Review

The Wonderful World of Chocolate and the Sweetest Place on Earth

After riding Skyrush at HersheyPark and visiting ZooAmerica, the other highlight of our visit to Hershey world was creating our very own candy bars at Hershey’s Chocolate World. There are several different attractions inside Chocolate World and the first one we did was the Hershey make your own candy bar experience. 

When you purchase your ticket they enter your name into the computer. At each station you scan your ticket and it displays your name so you know where your candy bar is at all times. We donned the white hair nets and aprons we were given and proceeded inside to the candy bar design studio. Using touch screens, I selected my base to be white chocolate and added butterscotch and milk chocolate chips and opted for no sprinkles. Scan our tickets at the start of the assembly line and pull the lever to begin. A suction cup contraption picks up the chocolate base you picked out and sets it gently onto the assembly line conveyor belt. The bar slowly moves down the line stopping at each respective station to receive its proper fillings. A layer of chocolate is applied on top (the same for everybody regardless your base flavor) and your fledgling bar is whisked away into the inferno of the oven. While it cools you get to design your packaging.

Next up, we did the free Hershey chocolate tour. Please note, this ride is a replacement for the original Hershey factory tour, as the original Hershey chocolate factory tour was so popular, and drawing so many guests it was impossible to please them all without disrupting operations of the chocolate factory. So an omni-mover type ride systems was created to move thousands of people a day through the sets of animatronics and video screens, a sort of virtual Hershey plant tour explaining how chocolate is made. Fun fact: Milton Hershey chose the location in Pennsylvania due to the abundance of nearby cows for his milk chocolate (I guess it’s cheaper to transport cocoa versus milk). At the end of the ride you are given a free chocolate bar before being dumped out in a giant Hersheys store.

I can’t wait to visit Hershey park Hershey park again! Pictured below is the 2012 Chocolate World map of attractions. Click here for the Chocolate World hours of operation.