In a world increasingly leaning towards natural sweeteners, Skippi Ice Pops is embracing traditional sugar-based recipes. Despite the growing health consciousness, Skippi is trusting that consumers want to enjoy nostalgic frozen delights while savouring the familiar taste they love. Skippi founder and chief executive officer Ravi Kabra stated, “Even though we would like to start the ice popsicle in sugar-free variants as well, the market for sugar-free variants in terms of volumes could not be as big as the ones we are currently doing.”
While talking to BW Businessworld in an interview, Kabra talked about leveraging sugar products for benefit, eating habits in India and his company's plans. Edited Excerpts:
What makes Skippi Ice Pops different from the other brands available in the market?
At the moment, there are no major brands of ice popsicles, but there are ice popsicles or the so-called ice Pepsis that have been in the market for ages now. most of them come with very unethical practices of adding synthetic colours and synthetic flavours, which are cancer-causing ingredients.
That is one of the biggest USP where Skippy comes in that we are not only just safe, but we are also 100 per cent natural. That gives a lot of confidence to our consumers, which other brands cannot.
How do you source your ingredients and what's your approach to ensure quality?
The ingredients are sourced from multiple vendors who pass our quality tests in terms of how their practice of production. They go through multiple tests before they are onboarded onto our platform. Apart from that, in terms of quality control shelf-life testing, we have our in-house team which manages all the aspects of quality.
But the example of an ingredient as orange colour, which you see with Skippy, is an extraction from curcumin, which is nothing but haldi or turmeric. These ingredients are natural in its nature itself.
You said that your company use natural colour. Is there any plan to come with sugar-free ice pops?
Sugar-free ice pops are in the kitty. It is in the pipeline, but I wouldn't say very soon. India currently does have a lot of appetite for sugar-based products. Even though we would like to start the ice popsicle in sugar-free variants as well, the market for sugar-free variants in terms of volumes could not be as big as the ones we are currently doing.
You introduced Skippy Corn Sticks recently. What's next in the queue?
We started the standard flavours on day one. Then we had the 10 rupees packs and we added the desi flavour variants. We also had the bag of 36 popsicles, which we call the savour pack. Now we are also having new products added to our brand portfolio like the cream rolls and have got Skippy Corn Sticks. Recently, we have launched Skippy Crazy Corn as well. Very soon, you will start seeing even the kiosks and shopping malls with these kinds of new flavours everywhere across India.
What challenges did you face when you started and how life has changed after the Shark Tank?
After Shark Tank, the brand has extrapolated multiple times and has gone exponential in terms of brand value and equity as well. A lot of people now recognise us, not just the brand, but even us as a person. Initially, Shark Tank did give us a great boost, but every brand has to then continue the trajectory to reach its destination. The platform has given us a great boost, bsut it was a complete team effort over the last two, or three years that we have put in to reach where we are today.
To give you an example, I was facing challenges with one of the online platforms where Anupam Mittal came to my rescue. He connected me with the co-founder of the platform and then helped me get on board with a very nominal margin commission given to the platform. Similarly, Ashneer had helped me in getting organised in Dubai on a platform called Noon.
How do you see the frozen trade market evolving, particularly regarding the frozen mechanism that Skippy operates on? What role do you hope Skippy will play in that?
The frozen market is growing rapidly in India. The ice cream industry has suddenly seen a massive surge in its numbers and top line over the last four, or five years because consumers have increased their purchase parity. And there is a great amount of development in the frozen supply chain as well currently as we speak.
There are brands of ice cream that have done hundreds and thousands of crore of the top line. This is going to continue to grow. With Skippy, the bigger part is that firstly, we supply most of our products at ambient temperature. But even if we come to the consensus to sell it in a frozen popsicle format, we will be indirectly competing with the ice cream space. But again, it is a huge opportunity for us also to explore going forward.
Coming to numbers, how has been performance of your company in the last quarter and broadly in the last financial year?
We have grown more than 100 times from the day we began. In terms of revenue, we are at least seeing a 60 to 70 per cent jump year on year. In the last quarter, like any ice cream brand, our major performance comes from January to May, typically in the summer season. Monsoons are the periods where we sit back and relax a bit and let mother nature finish off the rains before we get started again.
How important is sustainability to Skippi ice pops and what steps have been taken in that direction considering ice pops are packed in polythene? How do you address the sustainability issue?
Sustainability is important to us as a brand. And as an individual, it is important to me as well. For example, the biggest sustainability step is taken by using natural ingredients. Our products are very sustainable. Instead of using synthetic colours or chemicals. The first step we have taken is to go 100 per cent natural. Secondly, at every point, we ensure that the plastic that we use is more or less 100 per cent recyclable.
It is virgin plastic, which is 100 per cent safe for people to put in their mouths. Thirdly, we are trying to look at solar energy going forward when we set up a larger unit in terms of converting our power consumption also into a go-green kind of mechanism. So, there are steps that we are taking up and we are in an R&D discussion with a lot of plastic manufacturers to see whether we can go for a 100 per cent recyclable kind of plastic for the upcoming few years.
What about the demand for the Skippi pops, is it primarily coming from tier 1, tier 2, or tier 3 cities?
We are seeing good demand from the metro cities. But during the major season time, we see massive demand coming from the tier-two cities also. But, we as such do not serve these tier two cities in a full fledge. However, the demand is there in a big way. Andaman Nicobar is an island where we serve Assam, Mizoram. Never thought that Skippy would be going there, but we still have got good demand coming from there. We are trying to cover two, or three of North India. But again, when I say covering two, or three states of the northeast, please don't expect us to be the Parle-G, which is available in all the states. We are available in pockets across the state.
Skippi recently raised Rs 10 crore aiming at the Rs 70 crore revenue. Is there any plan for fundraising in the coming days?
We are just trying to close the balance of the round right now. Hopefully, by October, we will be able to close that round. We have just started a kiosk model. A shopping mall where all the Skippy products are being sold there and we will start expanding this to multiple shopping malls across India, where people could walk in while they are shopping and grab an ice popsicle on the go.
What is your short-term and long-term growth plan? Where do you see Skippy in the coming two or three years?
Coming two or three years, Skippy will become one of the largest F and P players in India and Skippy will be doing a top line of at least 300 to 500 crore in terms of numbers. In the next five years, at least every household in India should have tried Skippy at least once in their lifetime, which is what we're trying to target.
