The boss of Equi’s has revealed major growth ambitions for the Scottish ice cream maker, building on the successes of recent years, and is targeting further UK supermarket supply deals and exports.
David Equi, whose passion for producing premium ice cream and the history of the business comes across strongly in an interview with The Herald, reflected on how his dad had told him “you are off your head” when he had suggested producing for external customers.
At the time, the family ran a café and restaurant in Hamilton, making ice cream for its own clientele.
Mr Equi learned from his father, Roberto, how to make ice cream during his holidays from university in the 1980s.
The business Mr Equi now heads can trace its roots back to 1922, when his grandfather, Pietro, opened his own café in Hamilton, after arriving in the Lanarkshire town from Tuscany
in 1915.
Mr Equi comes across as an extremely energetic leader of a business that has 26 staff – never slow to see the funny side of things.
And he is brimming with enthusiasm as he talks about securing the ingredients for the new pistachio flavour of Equi’s from a town in Sicily.
The business has recently undergone a major rebranding, adopting a picture of Michelangelo’s famous David statue and adding a waffle cone on the head. This reflects the Scottish-Italian nature of Equi’s – a nod to both the family’s roots in Tuscany and the traffic cone that is frequently on the statue of the Duke of Wellington on his horse at Royal Exchange Square in Glasgow.
Mr Equi is targeting annual turnover of £6 million for the award-winning ice cream business in the year to May 2027.
If this is achieved, Equi’s will have more than doubled its turnover in the space of four years.
Mr Equi revealed the business raised its turnover to nearly £3.5m in its last financial year to May 31, 2024, from less than £3m in the prior 12 months.
It made earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation of about £490,000 in the 12 months to May this year.
Mr Equi highlighted the major expansion of the firm’s manufacturing capacity. He signed the lease on the its modern manufacturing site at Rutherglen, near Glasgow, about four weeks before lockdown was triggered by the onset of the coronavirus pandemic.
Despite the situation that ensued, he was able to secure finance in the most difficult of climates to complete the refit of the premises, and the state-of-the-art plant, which he noted had capacity equivalent to annual turnover of about £10m, opened in October 2021.
Equi’s previously produced ice cream at a facility behind the family café in Hamilton.
All of the Equi-branded ice cream parlours the family previously owned are now under licence or management contracts and are supplied by Equi’s with ice cream.
Equi’s is resuming exports to the US, where it has a distributor, and already has an end customer in the shape of an upmarket gourmet grocery store chain in Texas, Central Market, which sources produce from around the world.
Mr Equi highlighted the potential to target what he termed the “Scottish diaspora” in the US, especially on the eastern seaboard.
He also flagged ambitions to export to Dubai, where he is visiting this month.
Mr Equi underlined ambitions to increase the already substantial presence of Equi’s in the supermarket sector, with large retailers currently accounting for about 35% of the turnover with the other 65% coming from the supply of independent outlets.
He noted Equi’s was “restarting” in Sainsbury’s at the end of this year, and currently supplies Morrisons, Asda, Co-op, Aldi, and Lidl.
Highlighting growth ambitions in the supermarket sector, Mr Equi added: “The only one we are not in is Tesco – that is part of our goal. We are traditionally from an ice cream parlour background – that is how we built the business up.
“We do everywhere from seaside places up to Gleneagles Hotel. It is all high end we do. It is all premium.”
Reflecting on the building of the business to its current turnover, he said: “The ice cream manufacturing side was just a spin-off from the café. The first year we did about 10 grand (£10,000) – it is quite a big increase.
“We moved to our new factory. We built that during lockdown, which is a huge story in itself.
“It has been much easier for us to promote that growth.”
Mr Equi, who noted the ice cream manufacturing business was “probably below £1m 10 years ago” in terms of turnover, added: “My dad had a café in Hamilton that we always ran as a café and restaurant. I wanted to make it (ice cream) for other people. He wouldn’t let me.”
He started making ice cream for other people after his dad passed away about 30 years ago.
Reflecting on the £10,000 turnover figure for the first year of this production operation, the 59-year-old recalled: “I said to my bank manager: ‘I think this is going really well.’. He was, ‘I don’t think so.’.”
Recalling a discussion he had with his dad about producing ice cream for other people, Mr Equi said: “When he was ill, I said to my dad, ‘This is what I fancy doing.’, and he said, ‘You are off your head.’. He did say, ‘Son, just do what you want.’. My dad was younger than me when he passed away – he was a young, fit guy.”
Mr Equi also recalls that his father told him to “just go where your heart is”.
Highlighting what drove him, Mr Equi said: “I wanted to make the best ice cream, and I wanted to win awards.”
Asked if he believed his dad would have been surprised by the size of the ice-cream manufacturing business that had been built up, Mr Equi said: “He never did anything without saving up and paying for it. He only operated on a very small scale for ourselves. He was never in favour of borrowing.”
Mr Equi flagged his belief that his dad “would have been a bit horrified to see what you have to do in terms of borrowing” to scale up.
However, he added: “I think he would love what we were doing, and he would love the factory. I am sure he would be unbelievably proud.”
Mr Equi expressed his gratitude for loan and grant funding from economic development agency Scottish Enterprise to help set up the new factory. And he highlighted the progress the business has already made in paying off most of the loan.
One of Mr Equi’s three daughters, 25-year-old Alex, is working in a senior role in the business, in sales and marketing, after graduating in business with first-class honours from the University of Glasgow. She has been full-time with Equi’s for about three years, having worked previously for the business when she was at university.
Mr Equi said: “I am 59. I need to be thinking about the future and what we need to be doing. That is why I am delighted my daughter is in the business – I didn’t force her into it.”
Asked if he expected his daughter to eventually take over the reins, he replied: “That is the plan. We do have a key management team.”
He highlighted the fact that Equi’s buys all of its milk from nearby Park Farm at East Kilbride.
It also uses entirely Scottish cream, sourced from Müller.
Mr Equi, while underlining ambitions to expand in the supermarket sector, emphasised the “artisanal” roots and nature of the business and the importance of getting the price for its premium ice cream right given the quality and cost of its ingredients.
He put the target price point for a 500-millilitre tub of ice cream produced by Equi’s at £3 to £3.50.
Mr Equi observed Scotland accounted for the vast bulk of the turnover of Equi’s at the moment, noting the business also sold some ice cream in England. And he revealed Equi’s was currently looking at the London market.
He highlighted the launch of three new flavours by Equi’s, including the pistachio offering.
Mr Equi flagged pistachio as a favourite flavour among Italians, like hazelnut, and emphasised its great popularity at the moment.
He pointed out the pistachio ice cream is “super-expensive” to make, but said he is “very pleased with it”.
Mr Equi highlighted his sourcing of pistachio from Bronte, a town in Sicily. And he noted an expectation among Italians that pistachio should come from Bronte, and that hazelnut should be sourced from Piedmont.
He underlined the importance he attached to sourcing ingredients. He recalled he had been to Madagascar to see the source of the vanilla.
The other two flavours launched by Equi’s are strawberry cheesecake, and chocolate hazelnut and raspberry, which have both been shortlisted in the dairy product of the year category in the 2024 Scotland Food & Drink Excellence Awards.
Mr Equi noted that the company’s double cream vanilla product had seen it crowned ice-cream champion and overall dairy champion at this year’s Royal Highland Show at Ingliston in Edinburgh.
He highlighted his victory in 2017 in the UK heat of the Gelato Festival at Spitalfields Market in London, a contest in which he did a demonstration and talk featuring his raspberry sorbet offering and was scored by the judges and voted on by the public. Mr Equi flagged the great strength of the competition.
Mr Equi went on to compete in the finals of this competition in Florence, coming up against ice-cream makers based in Italy, an event which he clearly enjoyed.
However, he noted that he received a less enthusiastic reaction from the judges in Italy to his talk.
Mr Equi delivered his speech in Italian, declining the offer of a translator.
He recalled the speech was received with some blank responses and he was told, ‘Maybe you should take a translator.’.
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