The Crolla family, who have been making traditional Italian ice cream in Glasgow for four generations, is to grow its Crolla’s Gelateria brand through franchising.
The company says the time is right for the franchise as ice cream sales in the UK are increasing and in the last six years sales have succeeded £1bn.
Peter Crolla, director of Crolla, explains: “For more than 120 years, the Crolla’s recipe for success has been simple – great customer experiences, hard-working employees and mouth-watering gelato. We decided to franchise the business as it is a proven growth strategy that works.
“Our franchise opportunity offers a great new career for entrepreneurs or passionate ice cream loving individuals. We are looking for people who have a passion for building the brand and we offer several unique ways to become a franchisee, based on the candidate’s passion and financial resources.
“We have all the strategies and operations in place to assist a franchisee in every aspect of their business, and also provide first class training and support.
“Ideally we are looking for someone who is passionate about the product, has good knowledge of the market and its competitors, possesses business acumen and awareness, and is a good communicator and a people person.”
Someone who is already reaping the benefits of the brand is Carol Cordiner, who recently took on the Aberdeen franchise. Cordiner said: “I have always wanted to open my own ice cream parlour and I felt that the best way of doing this was to team up with a company with lots of experience in the industry.
“My family used to own a couple of ice cream vans years ago and they have always been a big interest of mine. I tried several other ice cream companies and I preferred the taste of Crolla’s.
“The training and support throughout the journey has been great. As a franchisee I get access to all the excellent products and recipes and it has also been a pleasure working alongside a very passionate family.”
‘Get to know your franchisor’
“The advice I would give to any prospective franchisee is spend as much time as you can with franchisors to get a proper feel of who you are getting involved with. At Crolla’s I visited their other gelaterias, tasted all their products and was also given a tour of their factory. All this helped me to make up my mind to invest.”
Crolla’s offers a large selection of ice creams such as after dinner mint, coconut, honeycomb and mascarpone. Its sorbet range includes raspberry, passion fruit, mango and champagne. Sundaes vary from caramel shortcake, Amarena, Sofia Ava’s hot chocolate fudge sundae to the Knickerbocker Glory.
Crolla’s currently has opportunities available across the UK for single and multi-site franchisees. The franchise fee starts at £10,000 plus VAT; additional costs include store fit-out, equipment and working capital. This brings the total investment cost for a franchise to £90,000-£140,000.
About Crolla’s
Crolla’s was founded in 1895 by Serafino Crolla, who exchanged the warm sunshine of Italy, for the less predictable climate of Scotland and set-up his first shop in Queen Mary Street, Glasgow.
By the 1950s, the Crolla family had an ice cream factory and 30 vans on the road selling its delicious ice cream around Glasgow.
Today Crolla still supplies ice cream vans but has expanded to supply shops, cafés, wholesalers, restaurants and hotels. Its range of products now includes sandwiches, panini, desserts and speciality coffees.
For further information call 0131 664 1218, or email Steve@platinumwave.co.uk.