Kremi moves into fudge production
Published:Wednesday | September 25, 2019 | 12:00 AM
Ice cream manufacturer Caribbean Cream Limited, which trades as Kremi, will expand into the production of fudges under its frozen novelty line of products, before looking to secure new revenue from contract manufacturing.
Earlier this year, Caribbean Cream invested US$500,000 ($65 million) into the production line for frozen novelties, of which 50 per cent capacity is currently being used for the production of icicles, and is making plans to use up the rest.
“Fudge is one product that we are looking at, and it will be in a wide range … the plain fudge, in addition to the ice cream with the chocolate over it. Those are products we plan to bring to the market shortly. I’m not going to put a timeline, but it’s not this year,” Kremi CEO Christopher Clarke told the Financial Gleaner during the company’s annual general meeting on Tuesday.
Kremi’s venture into the frozen novelties business started about two years ago when it parted ways with Trinidad and Tobago’s Flavorite, whose novelties it distributed in Jamaica.
In March, the ice cream maker rolled out the icicles in kola champagne, grape, watermelon, sour cherry and green apple flavours, ending a more-than-decade-old hiatus in Jamaica’s production of icicles. Frozen novelties were once manufactured by Jamaican company Cremo, which was acquired by Nestlé in 1997.
Like its bulk ice cream, ice cream tubs, ice cream cakes and icicles, Kremi will target the local market with its line of fudges but still has its eyes on the international market.
“We are hoping for overseas at some point, but it’s a long road to get there. Another market that we want to tap into is contract manufacturing; once we are able to export, that’s a big market for us.
Caribbean Cream already manufactures for a novelty ice cream company in Jamaica that has a related business outside of Jamaica.
“We are hoping to get more of that kind of business in the future, but we have to see what happens. Ice cream is very expensive to transport, so a lot of companies prefer to hire manufacturing companies. It’s an item from which we do not expect to see an increase in margins, but we do expect to at some point increase sales,” Clarke said.
Caribbean Cream was created in 2004 by Scoops Unlimited Limited, the distributors of premium Devon House I-Scream, to serve a different market segment with high-quality, but less expensive ice cream. Along with its brand of ice cream and frozen novelties, Kremi has forged contracts with companies out of the United States and Suriname to distribute frozen treats in Jamaica.