Frozen desserts comprised 28.4% of all desserts on the menus tracked by Technomic in the first half of 2010.Vanilla and chocolate ice cream dominate the category, but frozen yogurt, frozen custard, gelato and sorbet are winning over more and more fans. When it comes to offering frozen desserts on menus, there are several key factors that make them sell.
- Complexity, customization and portions are all important to enticing customers to order dessert
- Operators need to differentiate their dessert items from those offered by retailers, and they need to make the offerings available in various sizes to attract diners who are concerned with health, value, or who are simply too full to eat a large dessert, says Mary Chapman, director at Technomic
- Restaurants can drive frozen dessert sales by offering items that are growing in popularity, such as ice cream floats and sodas, milkshakes and gelato
- Ice cream is the top dessert on menus and 68% of kids choose ice cream, ice cream cake or a sundae when they order dessert
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