Diletto opens plant and expands presence in retail
Valor Econômico
Founded in 2007, the São Paulo-based premium ice cream company Diletto, until recently delegated all its production to an outsourcing manufacturer. All ingredients used to come from Italy and the process was supervised by Leandro Scabin, founder of the company, who started the company from the recipe of his grandfather, manufacturer and seller of ice cream in the region of Veneto.
But in little more than three years in the market, the ice creams of Diletto arrived to 15 States and the production increased to 30 tons a month. "No outsourced manufacturer has time available to produce such volume", says Scabin has whose partners are Fábio Meneghini, Advertising Executive of WMcCann, and the former partner of Banco Pactual, Fabio Pinheiro. With investments of R$ 10 million (US$ 6.25 million) (financed by the BNDES - National Development Bank), the company has now its own plant in Cotia, in the Metropolitan Region of São Paulo, which began producing last month.
With machines from Italy, the plant has capacity for 300 tons a month, and it will help the company, which basically produces popsicles, to diversify its line. It will also play a key role in increasing its earnings, which last year was R$ 7 million (US$ 4.38 million), at nearly six times. "Our goal is to close the year with R$ 22 million (US$ 13.8 million) and 2012 with R$ 40 million (US$ 25 million) in sales", says Scabin, who not only continues importing from Italy all the ingredients used in the ice creams, but now has also started buying sticks from the Czech Republic. "It seems snobbish talking like. But they have a more insipid reforestation wood than that used here in Brazil for popsicle sticks. It is dark as mahogany and since the Czech manufacturers have more scale, it is even a bit cheaper than buying the sticks here", explains the entrepreneur.
Diletto is investing more than R$ 2 million (US$ 1.25 million) in the development of new products that should be launched as of August. "Besides increasing our volume, the very plant allows such freedom for the creation of new packaging, formats, recipes and flavors", says Scabin. The company has direct distribution in São Paulo and it is outsourced in other States. Today, supermarkets are already responsible for 50% of the volume sold. The rest stays with coffee shops, emporiums and kiosks of the brand located in shopping malls where the consumer profile fits classes A and B. The Diletto popsicles cost nearly R$ 7 (US$ 4.80) each since its launching. But the price list is being adjusted at nearly 6% upwards due to the high costs of the inputs.
To grow as planned until 2012, the company has two strategies. The first is to spread its own points of sale. The kiosks of Diletto are their own and they were only four at the beginning of the year. Eight are being opened among São Paulo, Brasília, Rio de Janeiro and Campinas. The idea is to open another 20 until the end of the year. The other front of growth regards events in which the company installs an old-fashioned popsicle cart to sell its popsicles. "At corporate events, we produce the popsicles with the brand of the company - thing that few manufacturers agrees to do", says Scabin. This way, according to him, Diletto generates experimentation and attracts more consumers. That is how the company began: the brand was launched at a great New Year's party in Trancoso, Bahia.