The South African ice cream market size reached R5.8-billion ($363.1-million) in 2025, according to data from market research firm Imarc Group. (Photo: Lama Roscu / Unsplash) When spotting an alluring tub of I’ll-start-the-diet-tomorrow ice cream at your local Checkers, exactly how the ice cream got there in the first place is not top of mind.
For Rialto, a division of the Libstar Group, it represents a logistical mountain that had to be moved at -22°C. Integrating 55 General Mills products into the local market has proved to be an exercise in operational agility and financial modelling for the company.
According to Derek Couzens, Managing Executive at Rialto, the introduction of the frozen component required for Häagen-Dazs forced the company to build a highly disciplined, costly infrastructure from the ground up.
“You’re bringing a 40-foot container into a central frozen warehouse, for example, in Cape Town. And then you’re taking product, dividing it up and sending it to three regional depots or hubs in Gauteng, Cape Town and KwaZulu-Natal. And then from there you are delivering on a daily basis a product that is fairly unstable in its form.”
And unstable it is indeed. The ice cream has to be stored at nothing less than -22°C and delivered at nothing less than -18°C, Couzens told Daily Maverick. “All of these factors really proved incredibly challenging in the beginning.”
Couzens explained that SA’s warmer climate and less reliable refrigeration systems lead to more product spoilage than in Europe. To prepare for this, the company factored a higher expected product loss rate of 7% into its financial budget.
A 2025 GeoPoll survey shows that 42.3% of consumers rank quality as their primary purchase driver before price and brand. The company treats the cost of melted stock as a strategic trade-off rather than a failure, betting that premium margins will easily swallow the losses.
The gamble might already be paying off. During the past five months, sales have outperformed 2025 targets twofold, according to Couzens.
Hunting the premium node
While the General Mills range is available across major retailers like Checkers, Pick n Pay, and Food Lover’s Market, Rialto is hunting premium nodes.
The rollout relies on targeted convenience channels, specifically forecourts.
“Nearly one quarter of all ice cream is actually sold out of forecourts. So we had to get our minds around sales representation, and regional stock holdings,” Couzens said.
He said that many of the 330 forecourt freezers had been sitting in the same spots for more than five years. Because post-Covid habits changed, the company moved these units to busier forecourts to find premium shoppers.
“We partnered with Maxi Cool to manage all technical work and refurbishments,” Couzens said. “Together we built a centralised portal that provides real-time data on each unit, including location, service history, technical issues and sales performance.”
Will the premium consumer drink the proverbial Kool-Aid (or rather soda float)? According to Kerry Elliot, Client Success Lead at Trade Intelligence, one in 10 shoppers take out personal loans to afford food.
“This trend is visible across all income brackets, not only in the lower end,” she said.
Brand promiscuity and the top-ender
The SA ice cream market size reached R5.8-billion ($363.1-million) in 2025, according to data from market research firm Imarc Group, with projected a growth rate of 2.89% through to 2034. The question is whether Häagen-Dazs steals share or expands the pie.
Paul Steegers, Senior Retail Research Analyst at Nedbank Corporate and Investment Banking, said that while consumers were struggling, the biggest drop in confidence during the middle of 2025 actually hit higher-middle-income earners.
Over the past few years, the “consumer class” of South African adults had become more price sensitive and more value driven, said Brandon de Kock, Director of Storytelling at consumer insights agency WhyFive. “When it comes to treats like chocolate and ice cream, all the evidence points towards them being seen as affordable little luxuries rather than frivolous expenses.”
However, consumer data suggests the South African “top-ender” has a large enough appetite for local premium products and eye-grabbing international brands. According to De Kock, top-end consumers are very willing to expand their repertoires.
“The reality is that in the higher SEM (Social Economic Measure) segments, there’s a high degree of brand promiscuity when it comes to standard versus premium food items,” De Kock said, adding that there was no noticeable trend of premium consumers trading down.
“We see, for example, that the same family that uses standard mayonnaise in salad dressing will also have a premium jar in the fridge that’s used for sandwiches.” He said he expected this new line of brands to follow the same pattern. If the products delivered on taste and quality, they would simply become part of the consumer’s regular repertoire, De Kock said.
While the ice cream brand’s global reputation was good, long-term growth would depend on a reliable supply chain.
“With that in place, we believe the brand has the potential to expand the premium segment rather than cannibalise it,” Couzens said.
The real challenge lies in figuring out where these global brands fit in the local psyche. According to De Kock, South Africans are becoming “legacy ambivalent” toward brands, though he admitted this was less true for a globally engaged youth market looking for treats.
“Marketing and visibility are going to be crucial elements of success whichever way you look at it,” he said.
Imports and industry
Outside of the freezer, Rialto’s integration includes Nature Valley, Old El Paso, and Pillsbury.
“The addition of four global category leaders strengthens our portfolio in key growth segments while expanding consumer choice,” said Wendy van Zyl, Category and Customer Executive at Libstar.
The next frontier may be local manufacturing.
“We’ve got to find a way of looking at perhaps taking a brand and finding some capacity within Libstar to manufacture,” Couzens said. “I think that could possibly take this business to the next level. But we’re not there yet.”
The township question
An unconventional strategy in Rialto’s playbook is a predicted pivot towards the informal sector. While premium ice cream is traditionally a suburban staple, Couzens sees an opportunity in the “massive” market within South African townships.
According to him, Rialto was employing resources to understand these markets better.
“Sitting in our so-called townships is a massive, massive market. I think this year will be a year where we will be employing resources to understand those markets better and how, despite a diminished disposable income level [in these markets], we’re going to position some of the premium brands there.”
He highlighted that global brands like Tabasco and Häagen-Dazs were already breaking into markets such as India and China, which Couzens said were a macro representation of what the company was trying to break into in terms of GDP and market characteristics. DM