Tip Top’s Chinese trade commitment
‘If you want to be in the market globally you have to be in China.’ Steve Thomson of Fonterra Brands
There are probably not too many 80-year-olds selling ice cream to China over the internet.
But this is just one of many milestones Tip Top is reflecting on this month, as it eyes its next 80 years and what markets it might try scoop up next.
Fonterra-owned Tip Top began as an ice cream parlour in Wellington in 1936, opened by Len Malaghan and Albert Hayman.
It has since grown to produce more than 23 thousand metric tonnes of ice cream every year, including 12 million Trumpets and about 8 million Popsicles.
Kiwis eat the second most ice cream per capita in the world, at about 24 litres a year, but Tip Top has recently turned its attention to the biggest ice cream market in the world: China.
‘‘If you want to be in the market globally you have to be in China,’’ Fonterra Brands export manager Steve Thomson said.
‘‘Per capita, we are way, way ahead of where China is, but of course what they lack in per capita, they make up for in population.
‘‘It’s about a US$5.6b (NZ$7.7b) market at retail.’’
In June, Tip Top said it was going to trial online sales of six of its two-litre tub flavours to China, using leading Chinese e-commerce provider, Tmall, which was operated by Alibaba Group.
The company stressed at the time there would be a lot to learn and it would need to take an agile approach to the market.
This week, Tip Top managing director Kim Ballinger, said she was ‘‘pretty happy’’ with the progress to date.
‘‘We’re on track with what we expected to be in terms of sales.
‘‘The market’s so big, we want to be part of that, and we believe we’ve got a product that really meets what Chinese families are looking for.’’
Thomson said Tip Top was looking at introducing other flavours, as well as bigger sizes, but it was quite a complex process.
The company had first had to battle somebody squatting on its trademark in China before it could even begin exporting, and they had been ‘‘extremely careful’’ about choosing a distribution partner.
Tip Top has five distribution points on the east coast of China, and limited deliveries to locations within a 24-hour radius of those points, which could cost about $8 to deliver.
‘‘We won’t accept outside that, you have to make sure that that product’s 100 per cent,’’ Thomson said.
Ballinger said Tip Top had a global reputation for innovation, such as its world-first ‘‘pizza box’’ device for putting three layers onto an ice cream.
But its real point of difference, particularly as it looked further afield, was its use of fresh milk and cream, natural colours and flavours and neglect of palm oil: commitments it made in 2013.
One pink ice cream uses beetroot for its colouring for instance.
The company has been exporting for about 40 years, mostly to the Pacific Islands, but had also been in Malaysia for about 13 years.
Thomson said it wanted to be a bigger player in the Japanese market - the biggest export destination for NZ ice cream.