Seneca Klassen
Founder, Chocolate Maker & Cacao Farmer
Following a lifelong passion for chocolate, in 2005 Seneca co-founded a chain of chocolate cafes located in the San Francisco Bay Area. A new generation of chocolate makers was laying the groundwork for today’s craft chocolate industry. At Bittersweet, he started to sell these new craft chocolates, and imported bars from producers around the world, so that his customers could educate their palates by tasting bars from many origins. This led to Seneca’s own bean-to-bar experimentation and he began buying beans from various countries, bringing them to California, and making chocolate as fast as he could learn.
In 2008, Seneca was asked to curate the chocolate panel at the Slow Food Nation conference in San Francisco, where he had a panel of leaders from the artisanal chocolate industry. Throughout the three-day event, nearly 100,000 attendees, chefs, farmers, and consumers learned how to better connect with their food and searched for transparency in the food chain, and with that inspiration in mind, he set his sights on creating an estate-grown chocolate company.
Since beginning Lonohana in 2009, Seneca has joined many of those original maverick artisanal chocolate makers as a leader in this small and tight knit-industry. Seneca continues to educate throughout the U.S. on both what it takes to start an estate-grown chocolate company and why it’s so important to change the current global business model.
He assists in leading chocolate adventure trips with his life partner and fellow chocolate entrepreneur Sunita de Tourreil, and together they have produced a five-part video series about cacao and chocolate across the globe.
He has earned multiple awards for his chocolate and perhaps most importantly continues to play a leading role in helping to establish Hawaii as a world-class origin for cacao and the young chocolate industry that has blossomed since his dream began a reality.
Lisa & Emma Klassen-Lee
Co-Founders
Lisa and Emma joined Seneca in the move from Northern California to Hawaii in 2010 to assist with the dream of building Lonohana Estate Chocolate. Over the years they have planted, pruned and picked cacao; helped build the chocolate factory; wrapped more bars in foil than any one can imagine; and loved (nearly) ever minute of it.
Today, Lisa is a marketing professional at an Hawaii-based Insurance Company and helps with marketing aspects of Lonohana. Emma works in both the factory and our retail store and thereʻs no one better to explain the entire process, because she has lived it. Emma is also a masterfully talented artist and began her college career in 2022 at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Her first artwork created for the packaging of one of our ONOMEA bars makes its debut in January 2024.
Lawrence, Virginie & Miles Boone
Co-Founders
Lawrence and Seneca grew up together in a small farming community in Central California, and in 2011 he, his wife and their son (only six years old at the time) joined in this adventure. Both Lawrence and Virginie have multi-decade careers in the wine industry, and the concept of launching an estate-grown chocolate company was not dissimilar to what had been undertaken in the Napa Valley a half-century before.
Lawrence & Virignie also wanted their son to experience and respect the importance of farming, to have exposure at an early age of what it means to work really hard and to not be afraid to dream big.
Lawrence handles the business aspects of Lonohana and helps guide the sales for the Company. Virginie makes sure our marketing and media are on point while their son, Miles, while happiest up on the farm is equally content cleaning the factory, working the store, driving the tractor or (thankfully) any task that needs to be done. He recently began his college career (yes this photo is dreadfully out of date) with a focus on Agricultural Sciences at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo.
Cynthia Cruz
Marketing & Sales
Cynthia has so many skills she’s the one who keeps everything rolling. With a decade of project management & marketing experience, primarily in the natural and specialty food industries, Cynthia primarily manages our marketing, but she also makes sure that all the daily challenges that pop up in a small business are professionally tackled whether its accounting, sales, production or tours.
Before joining Lonohana, Cynthia spent 5 years working in the marketing department at Down to Earth Organic & Natural Market here on Oahu and is passionate about helping Hawaii make further strides towards food sustainability.
Super passionate about craft chocolate, Cynthia brings fresh ideas and a level headed analysis to how to help Lonohana both thrive and make a bigger impact on the cacao industry here in Hawaii.
Tingting Huang
Assistant Chocolate Maker
Tingting joined Lonohana in 2023 after having worked most recently at The Halekūlani Hotel here in Honolulu. Her decade plus of experience in the culinary arts began in Northern California where she worked at numerous Michelin-starred restaurants, and we are very fortunate that she moved to Hawaii in 2018 and now brings her passion and skills to our team.
Not only have our chocolate products continue to improve with her keen eye for quality, but Tingting also is playing an instrumental role in expanding our product lines intended to broaden the scope of how our guests enjoy Hawaii-grown chocolate, be it small run seasonal specials or origin-specific bon bons.
Carley Miller
Head of Production
@carleyandthechocolatefactory
Carley celebrated her 6th year working with us in 2023 and has been a part of every aspect of our company since the day she joined as employee #1. Her skills in the factory are unmatched and she makes sure to keep Seneca and the team on track - no matter the challenge.
She conceived of, perfected and has won multiple awards for Lonohana’s vegan ‘milk’ chocolate and plays an integral role in every product we create. She brings a dedicated sense of ‘just go for it’ that every entrepeneurial company needs, and backs it up with the most organized, thoughtful and efficient operational plans.
Robert “Duke” Morgan
Farm Manager
Duke joined us in 2021 as our farm manager after spending the prior six years as the Horticultural Specialist at Waimea Valley Botanical Garden. He brings over a decade of experience farming in Hawaii after graduating from University of Hawaii with a degree in Tropical Plants and Soil Structure.
Duke is deeply committed to and holds a wealth of knowledge in regenerative agriculture, the main farming philosophy we adhere to on our North Shore cacao farm.
Not only is Duke passionate about cacao and its potential here in Hawaii, his skillset includes aquaculture, breadfruit cultivation, forest preservation, nursery and orchard maintenance, indigenous plant propagation and protection, and continues a decade of consulting for Kohala Forest Reserve and it's native endangered plants.
Pictured here with our most tenured and essential worker “Coco” the tractor.
Gopika Toprani
Retail Manager
Gopika joined Lonohana as a Sales Associate in early 2023 bringing infectious enthusiasm and years of prior retail, events & design experience. Within a few weeks, at our store in SALT@OurKaka’ako, Gopika was leading by example and making improvements in how to tell our story and better engage with customers.
By early Fall, her desire to help us reimagine what our chocolate tasting experiences could be, she took over as Retail Sales Manager. Gopika has been instrumental in elevating our customer engagement as well as leads a team of amazing Sales Associates, training, experimenting and always greeting guests with a warm welcome and a smile.
With a deep passion for the environment and humanity, Gopika is also an in-demand yoga and meditation instructor often donating her time to people and communities that are dealing with hardship, conflict and stress.