When a brand makes a dedicated effort toward improving the customer experience, especially when it permeates the company’s culture, good things usually follow.
That has been the case for Marble Slab Creamery during the past two years.
After restructuring pricing and improving the customer experience over the course of two years, the brand continues to experience a major turnaround in positive sales, boasting a 5.8% increase in same-store sales, a 4% increase in transactions, and nearly a 10% rise in Average Unit Volumes (AUVs) year to date.
Company officials attribute the sales increase to the national ice creamery’s unlimited mix-ins pricing, which allows customers to add as many mix-ins that will fit into the ordered cup size or cone for a set price, increased messaging regarding its in-store homemade small batch premium ice cream, and emphasizing fresh baked waffle cones at no additional cost.
Marble Slab Creamery’s sister concept, MaggieMoo’s Ice Cream & Treatery, is transitioning and most stores have, or are in the process, of converting to the more recognized Marble Slab Creamery brand.
What’s more, Marble Slab Creamery’s success in the past two years ended five consecutive years of significant sales declines.
Marble Slab recorded positive results in 2014 with plus 4.39% in same store sales and plus 7.8% in AUVS. The significant turnaround in sales is a testament to increased customer satisfaction and an overall increased value proposition.
“Marble Slab Creamery has always had superior ice cream and mix-in offerings that customers love, but we were always considered a small player in the national ice cream shop scene,” said Allison Lauenstein, vice president of ice cream brands for Global Franchise Group, the strategic brand management company behind Marble Slab Creamery. “We’ve improved the direction of the concept, reconnected to our customers, and bettered the Marble Slab experience. We’ve worked hard to increase sales and profitability by emphasizing our differentiators and we anticipate continued results. We might be smaller than Baskin Robbins and Cold Store Creamery, but we’re coming on stronger than ever with our outstanding performance.”
Marble Slab is continuing to build on its improvement momentum and recently launched a new line of unique and inventive ice cream cakes in 10 over the top flavors: Peanut Butter Chocolate Brownie Overload, Chocolate Rocky Road Brownie, Cookie Jar Chaos, Snickers® Snackers Snuckers, Savannah Banana Fudge, Mint Chocolate Meltdown, Mocha Cappuccino Fudge, Raving Craving Sprinkle Cake, Visit to the Candy Shoppe and Strawberry Shortcake.
Marble Slab Creamery, a leading purveyor of chef created super-premium hand-mixed ice cream and the innovator of the frozen slab technique, was founded in 1983. Every batch of Marble Slab Creamery ice cream is fresh made in small batches in store using dairy from local farms and flavor ingredients from around the world. Today, Marble Slab Creamery is enjoyed by consumers across the globe with locations in Bahrain, Canada, Guam, St. Lucia, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Guyana, United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Singapore, Pakistan, and the United States.