Creative Capital: Her farmers' market stall is now one of Singapore's coolest ice cream companies
Who doesn't love an ice cream sandwich? Eight years agone, journalist Natasha Chiam, who graduated with a constabulary caste and briefly worked in the legal sector, started making bootleg cookies and ice cream, selling them at weekend markets.
Her delicious combinations quickly made her Water ice Cream & Cookie Co (ICC) a local standout and congenital a devoted following. Today, ICC is i of the biggest independent players in frozen confections in Singapore.
This October, Natasha is launching ICC Kids, inspired by her experiences equally a young mother. ICC Kids is a range of what Chiam describes as "wholesome baked goods and ice cream for children and new mothers".
WHAT WAS THE ORIGINAL INSPIRATION FOR ICC?
Growing upwardly, my parents would spend a lot of time in the kitchen cooking with my brother and me. It was truly the eye of our home and many of my happiest childhood memories are making and sharing food with my family. I think because of this, nutrient has e'er been something I share with those that I intendance near.
ICC started at home, with water ice cream sandwiches that I made for my now-husband. He loved them and encouraged me to bring them to farmers' markets and popular-ups effectually Singapore. That is how the business organization began.
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WHAT ARE YOUR MEMORIES OF THOSE EARLY DAYS SELLING AT WEEKEND MARKETS Dorsum IN 2012?
One of the craziest things is that I did almost all of our deliveries myself for the first two years, rushing around Singapore in a mussed-up rental.
I used to push my trolley into commercial loading bays with all the tough truck drivers. They would always be amused to run into me at that place – I'm rather short and would be half-hidden behind my tower of ice cream boxes. Plus, female drivers are all the same a rarity. Driving would often accept most of the 24-hour interval. That meant I would only get to the actual piece of work at night. In retrospect, ii years seems likewise long, but when you lot are a start-up with zero external funding, saving every dollar counts.
That feel definitely made me tougher. Doing hands-on jobs like those has allowed me to understand all aspects of my business and thus made me a improve manager. I am more able to understand challenges that employees at all levels of my company face because I've worked in every role from commitment to cleaning, production, marketing and management.
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It actually made me a ameliorate person too. I'd previously had the privilege of working in rather cushy jobs, so information technology was heart-opening to learn how hard bluish neckband workers, like delivery personnel and factory product staff, have to work and so that consumers can enjoy nice products and convenience. It puts things into perspective.
THE COMPANY HAS CERTAINLY GROWN AND DIVERSIFIED OVER THE YEARS.
Growth is never easy. If I had known how difficult it would be, I probably would never have quit my ix-to-five chore and taken the plunge into business. Initially growth was very organic, or even sometimes serendipitous.
For example, 1 of our first customers happened to exist a business, which is what pushed me toward manufacturing rather than running retail stores. This direction has allowed me to proceed to grow the business with probably greater success than I could have achieved in Singapore'southward tough retail environment.
Equally the years go past, yous learn more, and you take on more responsibleness so growth is definitely planned. I have employees to support, then I am very careful about planning future expansion and how to use the company's finances. Being careful and rather conservative also helped us brand information technology through the recent shutdowns due to the pandemic.
TELL US Near YOUR BUSINESS TODAY. HOW HAS Information technology Changed AND EVOLVED?
We take grown from a single farmers' market stall to ane of Singapore's leading ice cream manufacturers. When we showtime started out, everything was truly artisanal and hand fabricated. At present, because nosotros supply to supermarkets and F&B bondage who in turn serve thousands of people each twenty-four hour period, nosotros have a duty to ensure consistent quality and food safety for all of our products.
Our products are IS22000 and HACCP certified, which ways as a business we accept many measures in identify to ensure full food safety for all of our products. While our recipes accept basically remained the aforementioned, we accept had to edit certain things. For case, we now utilise a very small percentage of stabilisers to improve shelf stability and product quality – when nosotros started out we were stabiliser-free.
I used to automatically think that stabilisers are bad for your health, but not all stabilisers are created equal. The ones we use are high quality, as well every bit 100 pct plant-based and vegan certified.
We practise more wholesale these days, every bit nosotros still do not have a retail store – all of our retail is online via our website. Almost wholesalers purchase our pints or large food service tubs. The ice cream sandwiches are also nevertheless our signature product. We have a loyal following who buy them at independent cafes and also directly from the states.
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YOU As well SELL Exterior OF SINGAPORE. Tin You TELL United states of america Nigh YOUR INTERNATIONAL EXPANSION?
We are sold in Brunei at a gourmet grocery chain called Supa Save. We are also in talks with distributors in Australia and the Middle East. So far, with overseas exports, we've been approached by the buyer and then in that way that makes things easier – these companies already have presence in their home countries and are motivated themselves to add our products to their line-upwardly.
We also have an ice cream company in Jakarta called Cream Fiction. There, we offer abode delivery, have a mill, and 4 scoop shops selling premium water ice cream cups, cones, shakes and our water ice cream sandwiches. We as well do catering and supply wholesale to F&B businesses and schools.
TELL US Nigh THE NEW LINE, ICC KIDS.
ICC Kids is a line of wholesome broiled appurtenances and ice cream for children and new mothers. We hope to give time-pressed parents the ability to offering their kids healthy, home-made treats instead of processed supermarket snacks. All items have low or no sugar, and where saccharide is used, it's organic and unrefined.
We've also packed a lot of the broiled appurtenances with fruit and vegetables like carrots, bananas and zucchini which nosotros get fresh from the wholesale market place. All the children's products, including the ice cream, are also egg-complimentary and nut-free, then kids with allergies can still savour them. That said, 1 of the lactation cookies contains macadamia basics. Our manufacturing plant does process nuts so if a child is allergic or sensitive to even to trace elements of nuts, we recommend avoiding our products.
I actually fabricated all of the items in this range first for my own son, who also happens to have an egg allergy, making sure that they are full of wholesome ingredients and are made just similar a parent would make at abode, from scratch.
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If yous look at grocery stores, well-nigh pre-packed snacks – even the organic ones – are highly processed puffs or crackers, that usually contain vegetable oils, salt and sugar. On the bakery side, most don't differentiate between bakes for adults or children. Snack products are generally made without much consideration for childhood health, and equally such there are very express options for many parents.
I did several rounds of testing and sent lots of samples to friends for their children to try. Children are totally honest with their feedback, then it was piece of cake to iterate based on what they said! I think there was only one time I pushed it too far with a carbohydrate-costless zucchini muffin that fifty-fifty the most adventurous child couldn't finish.
OF THE NEW ICC KIDS SNACKS, WHICH IS YOUR OWN PERSONAL FAVOURITE?
I love the Nibbles – they're like mini cookies – in both the Cheese and Choc Raisin flavor. I think a lot of parents actually eat their kids' snacks. I mean, who has time to brand their own? I often observe myself snacking on these piddling bites. They're great to throw in your work bag, or use every bit lunchbox fillers.
LOOKING Back, WHAT WERE SOME OF THE Almost CHALLENGING OBSTACLES Yous NEVER Predictable BUT HAD TO OVERCOME IN MAKING THE BUSINESS SUCCEED?
About recently, the covid-xix state of affairs. Information technology'due south a one time in a lifetime kind of experience that nobody could have predicted. Ice cream manufacturing was considered a not-essential business and nosotros were asked to shut down entirely for a few weeks.
To compound that, our food service business organisation fell to nearly nil for months considering restaurants were severely affected. In order to overcome these challenges, we had to quickly pivot and replace the lost revenue with online home delivery orders, too equally to collect pre-orders during the period nosotros were shut down.
This involved investing heavily into digital marketing and also working out how to cope with the added logistical and authoritative load that small retail orders crave. For example, a wholesale social club might be S$500, just the average retail social club is around South$50. Instead of doing 1 delivery, our drivers have to do ten for the aforementioned dollar value. Our customer service staff take to procedure ten times the amount of paperwork, once more for the same dollar value. Obviously nosotros couldn't hire 10 times the number of staff to support, so nosotros had to become creative and figure out how to make things work, with a mix of outsourcing, improving internal processes and retraining staff.
We had to speedily and continually modify our concern model to make certain we had stiff acquirement to go on to provide for our staff. Thankfully we were able to exercise so successfully, and every bit such we were able to actually laissez passer on some of the regime's grants to businesses directly to our staff in the form of cash bonuses over the circuit breaker catamenia.
One instance: we gave all our foreign workers the Southward$750 monthly levy rebate in addition to their salary, and as well matched that amount for our Singaporean staff. I believe that if the company can afford to exercise so, these rebates and concessions should be enjoyed by the employees considering they are the ones who are often hit the hardest in difficult times and without them the visitor cannot survive. The pandemic really helped us get stronger together.
The pandemic also forced us to use technology to streamline and improve aspects of our business concern that were previously manual. For example, we implemented more software automations equally role of our order receiving and processing procedures to aid our staff who had to deal with the sheer volume of many small home delivery orders instead of fewer big wholesale orders during this period.
These are tools that we volition continue to use beyond the pandemic and accept definitely improved the quality of our customer service, fulfilment and besides staff morale.
Source: https://cnalifestyle.channelnewsasia.com/entertainment/creative-capital-natasha-chiam-ice-cream-cookie-co-247371
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