The Hindu Business Line : HLL sees ice cream parlour biz growth through malls

Mumbai April 4 HLL is expecting its ice cream business to expand in sync with the development of malls in the country. The company's relatively new parlour brand under Kwality Walls Swirls is expected to increase its franchise from the existing 30-odd parlours. Mr Sailesh Venkatesan, Category Head, Ice Creams, HLL, told Business Line, "We expect to grow our parlour business and are looking closely at this opportunity through the malls. The faster the number of malls come up, the more number of parlours would be set up.'' Having set up `Swirls' two years ago, HLL expects to increase its presence in the premium segment comprising freshly made ice creams.

Kwality Walls' carts

Meanwhile, nearly 30 per cent of its ice cream sales continue to come from the Kwality Walls branded carts operating in the cities across the country. "Except in Mumbai where hawking is not allowed, our carts have been running across all the cities and contributing to one-third of the ice cream retailing business,'' says Mr Venkatesan, for whom the bulk of HLL's retail business continues to come from the traditional retail outlets.

Last year, HLL registered a turnover of Rs 137 crore in its ice cream business and also posted profits. In fact, the business also grew at an unprecedented rate of 37 per cent.

The FMCG company had been struggling to make money on its ice cream brand since 1994 when it launched its Kwality Walls brand in the country. Impediments in setting up the cold chain infrastructure and slow category growth were cited as reasons for the business not taking off.

"Since 2005, we have been registering profits and our estimates are that the ice cream market is today growing between 10 and 12 per cent,'' says Mr Venkatesan.

This summer, HLL has decided to segment the ice cream market even further by having a special brand targeting kids.

By introducing a new brand, Moo, a calcium-enriched ice cream, the company expects to lure kids and their mothers with its `nutritional' offering.

"The ice cream market is already segmented and we have been catering to different segments with our offerings. In fact, the Kwality Walls brand in general has been targeting kids but within that we have created brands such as Cornetto to target teenagers and now have Moo specifically for kids,'' he says.

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