Artisan ice cream maker goes wholesale with support of local publican

THE team behind high quality ice cream brand Rays Ice Cream are branching out into the wholesale market by supplying their products to other businesses.

James Moloney and Paul Clabburn of the Fox & Hounds pub in Wroughton are among the first business partners to offer Rays Ice Cream on their menu. The couple are celebrating their first year at the pub this week. (June 4 2019)

James said: “We’re thrilled to be able to offer this product to our customers. The quality is excellent and we want, where possible, to use local suppliers. Customers seem to appreciate the fact that we are doing this and we’ve so far offered flavours including chocolate, strawberry, vanilla, rum & raisin, bubblegum, honeycomb and apple pie.”

Hadi Brooks, founder of Rays Ice Cream, said: “It’s the next obvious step for our business to offer our products to other businesses such as pubs, hotels, restaurants, tourist venues and many more. We set up our commercial kitchen in 2018 after outgrowing our small kitchen in our two shops and now we’re ready to spread our wings.”

Rays Ice Cream was set up by Hadi in 2011. It’s proved popular with families in Wiltshire with two shops, one in Swindon’s Old Town and another in Royal Wootton Bassett. The team can make up to 150 flavours of ice cream, including gluten free and vegan flavours. There’s even a dog friendly version. The top five flavours are vanilla, chocolate, raspberry ripple, bubblegum and salted caramel.

Hadi said: “The quality of our product is simply borne of great ingredients including local whole milk and double cream with no cheap fillers. Many ice creams contain no milk or cream at all. 

“We make our ice cream in smaller batches and it’s churned slowly for a short amount of time – so it’s not full of air. Adding some air is an essential part of the ice cream making process - it stops it becoming rock hard. However many brands have as much as 70 per cent air in their products. You can tell when you taste it, it's called ‘mouthfeel’ in the industry. Our products are denser, more luxurious and a lot more filling.”

For the wholesale market, they can offer up to 35 flavours and can even adapt them for specialist events for businesses to use as an unusual marketing tool.  For more information on Rays Ice Cream and its wholesale service visit www.RaysWholesale.co.uk/wholesale