Ice Cream the Naturals way

(Image Source: www.naturalicecreams.in)

Think of summers and the first thing that comes to your mind is ice cream. As a matter of fact it is something that reminds everyone of their childhood. Ice cream industry is actually very big with major players like Uni Lever owning brands like Ben & Jerries and Walls.
 
In India the ice cream market was mostly dominated by local players like Kwality, Nirulas and Gay Lords but that changed after the liberalization in 1991. That led to multi-national Ice cream makers like Dollops and Baskin Robbins to enter India. A host of Indian players emerged as well like Amul and National Dairy Development Board (NDDB) under the brand mother dairy.
 
Thought most players continue to play in the main stream flavors, there is a brand in India that has created a market for itself in very different Ice cream flavors That brand is naturals ice cream.
 
Established in 1984 in Mumbai, Natural ice cream has been pioneer in making artisan ice creams using only fruits, dry fruits, chocolates, milk and sugar. Their website claims that they add no preservatives or stabilizers in the ice cream. This idea was conceptualised by Mr. R S Kamath, CMD of Kamaths Ourtimes ice creams Pvt. Ltd.
(Source: www.naturalsicecreams.in)
 
The unique thing about naturals is the heavy usage of local fruits and flavors in India. RS Kamath got a very good knowledge of fruits due to the work he had put in with his father, who was in the fruits business. In his later years he worked extensively with his brother who had a slew of eateries which served among other things ice cream. The challenge was that as the process was manual it took a long time to scale up production in India.
 
RS Kamath designed a machine that could automate this manual process and even designed a machine that could remove the seeds.

(Image Source: Fanpop.com)
 
Some of the interesting flavors are tender coconut, Natural Mango, Papaya Pineapple, Roasted Almonds and Coffee Walnuts. Now this is a very good example of differentiation for a brand. If Naturals decided to take on the behemoths in flavors like Strawberry and Vanilla they would not be able to compete on the scale and the distribution. Most major players like Uni Lever or Baskin Robbins makes the main stream ice creams. But this strategy of making a very differentiated offering is a very good way to survive in the very competitive ice cream market.

 
Today Naturals Ice Cream has more than 70 outlets including one down the road from where I live in Bangalore.