Cold Foods Industry NewsProduct Development & Manufacturing

State of the Industry 2017: Private label drives frozen desserts category

Store brand/private label products account for nearly 20% of all frozen dessert sales, with packaged and novelties combined, and as much as half the sales in the sherbet/sorbet/water ice category.

Sales of private label frozen desserts have grown steadily over the last couple of decades, according to “Ice Cream and Frozen Desserts in the U.S., 9th Edition,” a study produced by Packaged Facts, Rockville, Md. In fact, store brand/private label products account for nearly 20% of all frozen dessert sales, with packaged and novelties combined, and as much as half the sales in the sherbet/sorbet/water ice category, the study says.

The starting point was the explosion in quality among branded frozen desserts marked by a burst of activity in the premium category. Private label frozen desserts, which accounted for a lot of the low-end activity, were being squeezed out of the market.

Also becoming a factor in private label sales increases for frozen desserts was the expansion of upscale, specialty and natural food retail chains such as Whole Foods and Trader Joe’s, which actively promote their store brands as top quality offerings.

Looking ahead, there are good reasons to believe that private label frozen desserts will continue to gain market share, the study says. Retailers are expanding their offerings with more organic and natural products as well as jumping on the clean label bandwagon with products positioned for their absence of artificial ingredients.

Meanwhile, 66% of consumers reported that their last-eaten cake was at or from home (scratch, made from a mix or purchased from a grocery/retail outlet), says MenuTrends Keynote on Desserts, produced by Datassential, Chicago. From red velvet to pumpkin, croissant hybrids to savory sweets, consumers are eating desserts both at home and in restaurants.

Click here to view market trends for this category.

To learn more about these and other dessert trends and charts, go to http://bit.ly/2qkpeuU.

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Marina Mayer was formerly Editor-in-Chief of Refrigerated & Frozen Foods. Previously, she spent four years as managing editor and executive editor of Snack Food & Wholesale Bakery and Dairy Foods, both sister publications. In this role, Mayer was responsible for reporting on market trends, ingredient R&D, production technology and new products within the dairy, snack food and wholesale bakery markets. Prior to joining BNP Media, she served a five-year tenure as editor of quality control for Manufacturers' News, Inc., where she was named “Manager of the Year” in 2006. Previously, she worked as an editorial assistant for Insider Magazine and worked as a contributing features writer for her college newspaper, the Indiana Daily Student. Mayer was a recipient of a Young Leader Scholar award, presented from American Society of Business Publication Editors (ASBPE), which is given annually to only five U.S. journalists, 30 years of age and under. She is a graduate of Indiana University with a bachelor’s in journalism.