The chocolate retailer will launch an internet operation in the US this year and is likely to open its first stores there in 2009. It will be the retailer's first foray overseas.
Co-founder and managing director Angus Thirlwell said he planned to open a distribution centre in the US and introduce a home delivery service by the end of December.
Thirlwell said: 'We have identified that we can turn Hotel Chocolat into a global brand. We are getting the real connoisseur to take notice and we are taking that into overseas markets. We are putting British chocolate back on the map.'
Hotel Chocolat has about 5,000 customers in the US who receive deliveries from the UK, according to Thirlwell.
In the UK, he said that Hotel Chocolat wants to increase store numbers from 22 to 30 by the end of the year. Some stores are registering double-digit like-for-like sales growth.
The£38 million sales are a combined total for Hotel Chocolat's four divisions, which include its retail arm, multichannel, corporate gifts and its Chocolate Tasting Club business - a subscription-based club that sends sample chocolates to members.
Hotel Chocolat opened 10 stores last year, which has helped to drive the retailer's growth. Thirlwell said all areas of the business are profitable.
He added that the company's sales and profit growth was funding retail expansion, as well as investment in its factory in Huntington, near Cambridge, and in its own cocoa estate in St Lucia in the Caribbean.
Prices of Hotel Chocolat's products range from£2.50 to more than£100 and are typically higher than high street rival Thorntons.
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