“We rely on us having a better season than the previous one to achieve this year’s budgeted growth, as well as on the VAT cut for food products enforced as of June 1,” said Vasile Armenean, owner of Betty Ice, which has a production facility in Suceava.
The bad weather gave ice cream manufacturers trouble last year, considering the segment is highly dependent on the temperatures outside. This showed in the trend of Betty Ice’s business, which only increased by 1% last year.
Vasile Armenean has previously said ice cream sales may even double in a hot day compared with a rainy day. Weather also made an impact on other markets, such as beer, where consumption dropped by 8.6%, and soft drinks, which decreased by 2% to 3% in volume.
Betty Ice ended last year with 5% increase in profit, which reached RON6.1 million. The ice cream company budgeted RON8 million net profit this year, which means a 9% profit margin.
“We had a better strategy last year, so that’s why we had a higher profit,” Armenean said without going into details. (EUR1=RON4.4382)
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)