Inside Scoop: Baked Goods and Ice Cream

Baked goods like cookies and cakes go hand-in-hand with ice cream as a taste treat. Several major players in the two categories have formalized these pairings in the last year through licensing deals bringing baked goods brands into the ice cream aisle or expanding existing efforts in the space: 

• This month, Bimbo Bakeries USA’s Entenmann’s brand, represented for licensing by Brand Central, paired with Turkey Hill for two flavors of ice cream: Entenmann’s Soft Baked Chocolate Chip Cookies flavor, with a sweet cream flavored base, and Little Bites Fudge Brownies flavor, with a chocolate ice cream base. Distribution is through select grocery chains in the Northeast U.S., where both brands are headquartered. 

• McKee Foods’ Little Debbie brand announced the latest new products under its deal with Hudsonville Ice Cream last month: Little Debbie Ice Cream Sandwiches in Oatmeal Creme Pies and Cosmic Brownies flavors. The first is vanilla crème ice cream between oatmeal cookies and the second is brownie-flavored ice cream between fudge brownies with rainbow chips. The sandwiches are available in a variety of U.S. supermarket chains. The ongoing Little Debbie line with Hudsonville also includes pints of ice cream in flavors such as Apple Fruit Pies and Zebra Cakes, as well as ice cream bars.  

• Last March, Lotus Bakeries and its Biscoff spice cookie brand added ice cream to their existing licensing relationship with Mondelez. The ice cream and frozen novelties, which will be sold in several European markets starting this year, are being produced, sold, and marketed by Froneri. Froneri is a joint venture of Nestlé and PAI Partners that has a long relationship with Mondelez, producing ice cream under the latter’s Cadbury, Oreo, and Milka brands. Lotus and Biscoff have been marketing ice cream in-house since 2019, but the new deal will allow them to expand distribution globally. 

In addition to these grocery-focused deals, baked goods brands have occasionally paired with shops and restaurants for ice creams, usually in the form of limited editions. Just this month, the Johnny Rockets restaurant chain paired with Hostess for a Hostess Cupcake Shake, for example. But supermarket-centric pairings such as those in the list above are typically meant to be permanent additions to the freezer aisle.  

RaugustReports just posted its in-depth coverage of the key licensing trends spotted at New York Toy Fair earlier this month. You can read the full coverage here.