Ongoing Trends in Novelty Ice Cream
How it Started
Many classic American ice cream brands lay claim to the first novelty, including Good Humor which received a patent for chocolate-dipped ice cream bars in 1923 Good Humor History. Since that time, hundreds of variations of this classic ice cream novelty have been created and commercialized, with many unfortunately out of production today. From these humble beginnings, ice cream lovers globally have experienced sundae cones, the Choco Taco, Dip ice cream bites, and within the last 10 years, Mochi ice cream. But where do we go from here?
Healthy Ice Cream?
With the rise and fall of the better-for-you ice cream category in the last 7 years, led by global sensation Halo Top, the concept of eating better still looms within industry of decadence. Never mind the irony of wanting to eat ice cream and simultaneously wanting it to be good for you. Consumers today seem to know what they want when it comes to ice cream and the larger ice cream brands are gearing up to give them just that.
A few years back, a frozen yogurt brand named Yasso release “poppers”, which are bite-sized and chocolate covered frozen yogurt balls Yasso. They tout their caloric count right on the front of their packaging, a whopping 35 calories per bite. Now things are starting to make sense. What if instead of avoiding consumption of seemingly unhealthy things altogether, we could consume these products with restraint controlled by portion sizes? What if we did our best to make them healthier than traditional ice cream AND decreased the portion sizes? The product has taken off and led Yasso to a recent acquisition, which will undoubtedly mean that we will be seeing these products on more and more shelves.
Consumer Preferences Today
While Yasso has taken advantage of this newfound interest in smaller portion sizes, this consumer trend transcends this company. It has reverberated throughout the industry and “mini” is new IT thing. In a sense, it seems as though consumers wanted to practice measured indulgence all along when consuming ice cream, and this intentional shrinking of portion sizes was a motivational kick in the right direction for many.
There are still many ice cream purists out there that yearn for traditional and indulgent cow’s milk ice cream and this trend is for them too. There are also indulgent brands taking this mini trend and capitalizing on reduced portion sizes to minimize the caloric intake per unit. This has helped many individuals who count calories to be able to consume the products that they enjoy, but now in a strategically portioned size. We don’t know where the trends in the category will take us in the next 5 years, but we do know that ice cream is still the go-to dessert for many around the world.
