Located on Rajpath Bungalow Road in Bodakdev, Shreedev Enterprises is a medium-sized grocery shop that has always stocked Amul ice cream. It even carries the Amul sign board over its awning. Early this month however, Shreedev’s customers were pleasantly surprised to see a Hocco ice cream freezer installed in the store’s premises. Positioned at the front end of the store, near the cash counter, the brand-new freezer has taken pride of place, relegating Amul to the back. “Customers want Hocco ice cream. It is selling fast,” says the grinning young man at the cash counter.
Till recently, a gentleman’s agreement existed between ice cream brands and Ahmedabad’s grocery stores that they would not stock competing brands. That agreement has now been broken with an aggressive push by Hocco to expand its distribution. How will the competition respond? Jayen Mehta, managing director of Gujarat Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation (GCMMF), which owns the Amul brand, says new brands like Hocco have only a short time to incubate and the window will soon close. “Ahmedabad is a mature market and consumers know their ice cream well. Eventually, it will be the survival of the fittest,” he says.
Amul has over 8,000 kirana shops stocking its products in Ahmedabad but there is no exclusivity clause in its contract with them. Most of these shops were considered too small to have more than one freezer but some now find it worthwhile to make room for an upcoming brand like Hocco. As the market leader, Amul is the first to be affected, but other brands are set to be affected by this disruption as well.
One of Ahmedabad’s oldest brands, Vadilal started as a retail outlet and its chairman Rajesh Gandhi is a veteran of many ice cream wars. Hocco has not made inroads into any Vadilal-selling shops yet, but it is not for want of trying. “Everyone must perform their duty in this situation, be vigilant and agile. Retailers do have a choice. So do suppliers,” says Mr Gandhi.
Hocco, which stands for House of Chona Collaborative, itself is no stranger to Ahmedabad’s ice cream market. The Chona family were the original promoters of Havmor ice cream, which was sold to Lotte of South Korea in 2017. The Chonas returned to the ice cream business last year with the Hocco brand, which was initially sold through the Hocco chain of 62 restaurants. In the next phase, the brand made its appearance in stores that previously did not stock ice cream. It is only recently that the brand has begun distributing through kirana shops that already have other brands.
“We have currently 1,300 retail outlets in Ahmedabad,” says Hocco managing director Ankit Chona. “Our biggest challenge has been to secure freezer space with dealers and distributors, given the presence of many established brands, but we’re navigating these challenges. Our goal is to be accessible across all consumer channels: general stores, quick commerce platforms, restaurants.”
Even as it expands distribution, Hocco is offering up a host of promotions that include cut-rates for popular flavours like Kaju Draksh that make for fast sales. This is not only endearing the brand to retailers, but to customers as well. With other brands likely to join the promotion bandwagon, the coming months may well see Ahmedabad’s ice cream market growing faster than ever before.
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