Ahmedabad-based ice cream maker Havmor Ice Creams has tied up with another homegrown pharmaceutical major Zydus Wellness, a group company of Cadila Healthcare (Zydus Cadila), for sourcing ingredients for its latest 'Sugar Free' range of ice creams. Also, the tie-up would allow Havmor to use the 'Sugar Free' brand owned by Zydus for its ice creams.
"We have launched the new 'Sugar Free' range of ice creams in flavours like Vanila, Litchee Mango, Grapes 'n' Guava. We have tied up with Zydus to source the ingredient (artificial sweetener) for these ice-creams," said Pradeep Chona, chairman, Havmor Ice Cream. He also added that the tie-up enables them to use the brand 'sugar free' in its ice creams as it is owned by Zydus which makes and markets a popular artificial sweetener brand by that name.
Sugar Free is the country's leading artificial sweetener brand, and it has extensive range of sugar substitutes for a variety of usages through its portfolio of sub brands - Sugar Free Gold, Sugar Free Natura, and Sugar Free Herbvia which come in pellets, sachets, liquid and powder formats. Sugar Free enjoys more than 85 per cent market share in the low calorie sweetener market segment.
Chona claimed that his new range of ice creams will be 98 per cent fat free and 100 per cent sugar free. It is targeted at the health-conscious customer.
These ice-creams are around 10-12 per cent costlier than the normal range.
Havmor had earlier dabbled in low calorie ice creams, and Chona claimed that the share of the low-calorie range is negligible compared to overall ice cream sales. "It would not be more than 1-2 per cent of our net sales, however, the margins are high in such categories," he added.
Last year the company had sold ice creams worth Rs 250 crore, and this year it is eying to touch Rs 300 crore in sales.
Industry insiders say that some expensive ingredients which slow down melting (as low fat ice creams tend to melt faster) and also bring the taste as close to normal ice creams, make the low calorie ice creams costlier.
While demand is lower compared to other ice cream ranges, companies feel it is gradually picking up. As Chona explained, "People are becoming more and more health conscious. Also, once we started advertising, the sales have picked up considerably. We are advertising this range in Mumbai as well, and we see good demand in the market."
Other players like Vadilal and Amul are also present in the low-calorie ice cream range.
Vadilal's managing director Rajesh Gandhi said, "We are present in the sector since 2002-03. At the moment, the segment does not have more than 1-2 per cent market share.However, in the long run as each segment is growing it makes sense to have presence in all the segments." Vadilal has three to four flavours in the low calorie segment.
