Latest / Small Business Success with Fexingo: Local Companies, Main Street Stories, and Community Commerce / How a Local Ice Cream Shop Beat Baskin Robbins with a Flavor Vote
Transcript
- Lucas: So you walk into a Baskin-Robbins and there are thirty-one flavors behind the glass. Walk into Scoop Du Jour in Portland and you might find eight. And yet, year after year, Scoop Du Jour is growing at a pace that makes the big chains jealous. Luna: Eight flavors against thirty-one. That sounds like a handicap, not a strategy. How are they pulling that off? Lucas: They flipped the script. Instead of the company deciding what flavors to make, they let the customers vote. Every month, Scoop Du Jour runs what they call a Flavor Bracket — four new flavor candidates, and customers vote online and in-store. The winning flavor gets produced for the next month as a limited-time offering. Luna: So it's like March Madness, but for ice cream. I love that. But does it actually drive business, or is it just a fun gimmick? Lucas: It drives serious numbers. Owner Jenna Reyes told me that the limited-time flavors from the Flavor Bracket account for about forty percent of their annual sales. And the really interesting part — those flavors have a higher profit margin than their core lineup. Luna: Higher margin? How? Limited runs usually cost more per unit because of small-batch production. Lucas: You'd think so, but here's the key: customers are willing to pay a premium for something they helped create. Scoop Du Jour prices the limited flavors at about six dollars a scoop, compared to four-fifty for the regulars. And people line up. Plus, because the flavor is only around for a month, there's urgency. People come in multiple times to get it before it's gone. Luna: So scarcity plus ownership. That's a powerful combo. But let's talk about the voting mechanism itself. How do they get enough participation to make it meaningful? Lucas: Great question. They keep it dead simple. In-store, there's a chalkboard with the four candidates. You get a sticker and put it next to your choice. Online, it's a Google Form linked from their Instagram. No app download, no account creation. They average about two thousand votes per month. Luna: Two thousand votes from a customer base of maybe ten thousand regulars? That's a twenty percent engagement rate. Most email campaigns would kill for that. Lucas: Exactly. And the beauty is, those voters become evangelists. They tell their friends, 'Hey, I voted for the honey lavender flavor, and it won. You have to try it.' That word of mouth is gold. Luna: So what kinds of flavors have won? Give me a few examples that really took off. Lucas: Some highlights: a balsamic strawberry with black pepper — sounds weird, but it was their best-selling limited flavor ever. A matcha white chocolate that sold out in two weeks. And a savory one, corn and basil, which was more divisive but generated a ton of buzz on social media. Luna: Corn and basil ice cream. I think I'd need to try that before judging. But it's interesting that even the weird ones get people talking. That's free marketing. Lucas: Absolutely. Jenna said the corn and basil flavor got them mentions in local food blogs and even a write-up in Portland Monthly. That's the kind of press you can't buy. Luna: Let's talk about the economics of small-batch production. If they're making only one limited flavor per month, they're not buying ingredients in bulk. How do they keep costs under control? Lucas: They're smart about it. First, they source ingredients that are already in their supply chain for other items. The balsamic strawberry, for example, used the same strawberries they put in their regular strawberry flavor. The balsamic vinegar was a small add-on cost. Second, they run the limited flavor for exactly four weeks, no extensions. That discipline prevents waste. They've gotten so good at forecasting that they sell out of the limited flavor about two days before the next one launches. Luna: So they've basically turned inventory management into a marketing tool. Sell out, create scarcity, then launch the next one. That's a virtuous cycle. Lucas: Exactly. And the data they collect from the voting process is incredibly valuable. They know exactly which flavor profiles their most engaged customers prefer. That informs their core lineup decisions too. Luna: Give me an example of how voting data changed their core menu. Lucas: Sure. They noticed that flavors with fruit and herb combinations consistently got high vote counts but rarely won because the nutty or chocolate flavors were more popular. So they introduced a permanent 'Heritage Series' of four fruit-herb flavors that rotate quarterly. That series now accounts for fifteen percent of core sales. Luna: That's using data to create a new product line. Very cool. Now, what about the cost of the voting system itself? It sounds like it's mostly labor and chalk. Lucas: Almost zero incremental cost. The chalkboard is maybe ten dollars. The Google Form is free. The time to set up the bracket is about an hour per month. The biggest investment is actually the social media promotion, but they already had an Instagram account. They just shifted content to highlight the bracket. Luna: So the barrier to entry is incredibly low. I can see this working for a lot of small businesses. A bakery could do a 'Bake-Off Bracket' for new pastries. A coffee shop could let customers vote on a seasonal latte. Lucas: Absolutely. The principle is the same: give customers a stake in the product, create scarcity around the winner, and use the voting process as a built-in marketing engine. Jenna told me that during the bracket voting period, their foot traffic increases by about twenty-five percent because people want to come in and see the candidates in person. Luna: Alright, let's talk about the downside. Is there any? Have they ever had a flavor that just bombed, even after winning the vote? Lucas: They have. The corn and basil I mentioned — it won the vote but then didn't sell well. They had to discount it heavily in the last week. But Jenna said that's okay because the conversation around it was worth more than the lost margin. And they learned that savory flavors need more education. Next time they'll pair a savory candidate with a tasting sample. Luna: So they treat failures as learning opportunities. That's a good mindset. But let's get to the bottom line: how much has this program actually contributed to their growth? Lucas: Over the past three years, Scoop Du Jour has grown from one store to three. Revenue is up a hundred and twenty percent. Jenna directly attributes about a third of that growth to the Flavor Bracket program. And here's the kicker — they've never spent a dime on paid advertising. Luna: Zero ad spend. That's remarkable. They've completely relied on organic word of mouth and social media driven by the bracket. Lucas: That's the power of giving customers a sense of ownership. When people feel like they're part of the process, they become your best marketers. And it costs almost nothing. Luna: Honestly, if that insight alone has been valuable to you as a listener, it might be worth buying us a coffee. You can do that at buy me a coffee dot com slash fexingo. No pressure, but it helps us keep doing episodes like this. Lucas: Absolutely. Every little bit keeps the show ad-free and focused on stories that actually help small business owners. So if today's episode moved your thinking in some small way, that's the link. Now back to Scoop Du Jour — Jenna also told me about a plan to expand the bracket to include a 'community choice' charity flavor, where proceeds go to a local nonprofit. Luna: That's a great idea. It ties the business even deeper into the community. And it gives people another reason to vote and buy. Lucas: Exactly. The Flavor Bracket isn't just a gimmick. It's a relationship-building tool that drives real revenue. And it's replicable. Whether you sell ice cream, bagels, or even hardware, the lesson is the same: let your customers help decide, and they'll reward you with loyalty and word of mouth. Luna: I think we could all use a scoop of honey lavender after this. Lucas, great episode. Thanks for digging into this. Lucas: Thanks, Luna. And to our listeners — go vote for something. It might just make your business sweeter.