Trade Secrecy in Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory

Abstract

Roald Dahl’s "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" is well-known as a dark fantasy in which five children win a visit to a whimsical candy company. Less conspicuous is the legal issue of trade secrecy driving the novel’s plot. Secrecy is not indigenous to fictional representations of the candy industry, but is widespread throughout its real-world confectionary counterparts of today and yesteryear. An investigation of the need for secrecy in this commercial sphere raises fundamental questions about the role of legal protection for misappropriations of secrets when actual secrecy seems to be paramount and about the relationship between trade secrecy and patent law.

Keywords: trade secrets, trade secrecy, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Roald Dahl, candy, chocolate, Hershey, Mars, patent law

JEL Classification: L2, L66, O31, O34, Z1