Although celebrating its 40th birthday this year, Frosty Boy Australia is showing no signs of slowing, with plans to ramp up its presence in the Australian convenience sector and drive more international growth, eyeing China and India in particular.
Based in Yatala in Brisbane, the frozen dessert and beverage manufacturer specialises in producing powdered base products including soft serve, frozen yogurt and beverage bases for cafes, convenience stores and quick service restaurants. The company has achieved 15 per cent growth year on year and currently exports to 48 countries.
Frosty Boy’s presence in the convenience channel is currently mainly in overseas outlets such as FamilyMart, Indomaret and 7-Eleven. Frosty Boy CEO Dirk Pretorius told C&I Week the company is now looking to expand its presence within the local convenience channel through its soft serve ice cream and premium beverage range, The Art of Blend.
“Consumers are looking for products that excite them. From that point of view, I think our range fits really well within the convenience category,” Mr Pretorius said, noting soft serve ice cream as a growing trend internationally in convenience stores.
“I think convenience stores are more and more getting into soft serve ice cream. We see it a lot in Asia especially at the moment, with FamilyMart and 7-Eleven, who are really driving soft serve in their stores.”
As well as soft serve ice cream, Mr Pretorius says its beverages offer, including premium line, The Art of Blend, which launched in September 2014, will be a big growth area for the manufacturer long term.
The range initially consisted of seven bases, however, has since grown to 10 and includes flavours such as Original Iced Coffee, Aromatic Spiced Chia, Finest Belgian Chocolate, Premium Mocha Latte, Velvet Dairy Frappe Base and Italian Style hot Chocolate.
The Art of Blend range is able to be used as frappes and slushies either over ice, or as a hot beverage. The range allows retailers to be creative and make the products their own by adding fruits, flavouring, toppings, syrups, or just water to the powders
Frosty Boy also has its sights set on further international expansion. In December, the company appointed national sales and marketing manager, Felipe Demartini, to the newly created role of GM sales and marketing, to support the Queensland-based manufacturer’s international targets, predominantly China and India.
“At the moment we’re really focused on India and China. They are two very specific markets that we driving hard at the moment. They have such big populations and if we can get those two right it will be worthwhile for years to come.”