PREMIUM brand ice-cream retailer NZ Natural Sdn Bhd plans to almost double its ice-cream sales within the next year to 7,000 scoops per day as it opens more outlets and taps into new market segments.Currently, some 322 litres equivalent to 3,500 scoops of New Zealand Natural brand ice-cream is sold daily at eight of its outlets.
Marketing director Khong Yao Han said that this year the company plans to open at least another five ice-cream parlours in the Klang Valley and Penang.
Apart from tapping into new market segments, it plans to widen its market by introducing reduced-sugar ice-cream suitable for diabetics which has been approved by the New Zealand Diabetic Board.
According to Khong, Malaysian per capita consumption of ice-cream is 10 times less than in the US or New Zealand.
This, he said, works to its advantage as it plans to “convert” non-eaters and occasional consumers to a more frequent eaters.
In this regard, apart from reduced-sugar ice cream it plans to offer new flavours, new creation of smoothies and sundaes adding to its already existing range of full-cream ice-cream, low-fat ice-cream, low-fat frozen yoghurt as well as 99 per cent fat-free sorbet range.
NZ Natural is controlled and run by two other Khong siblings, Kevin Khong Yao Lung (executive director) and Paul YN Khong (operations director).”We plan to open about five outlets this year. This year, investment in outlet openings including marketing and branding will be about RM2.5 million,” Khong said.
This three-year-old company operates eight outlets and has invested some RM4.5 million.
Typically, a New Zealand Natural outlet measures between 800 sq ft and 1,000 sq ft, with the largest outlet having a capacity to seat some 35 people.
“If all factors are ideal. We recoup our investment within one-and-a-half years,” Khong said.
New Zealand Natural also retails juices, smoothies and milk-shakes, thick-shakes, fruit-flo (a mixture of fruits and yoghurts) and hot beverages.
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