Seeking to expand its quickly growing (and already popular) business, central Brighton-based frozen yogurt startup, Lick, has hit crowdfunding platform Crowdcube to raise £200,000 and is offering 6.25% in equity.
Lick is all-natural, fat-free and made from 100% yogurt using the special method that its co-founders, Ky Wright and Owain Williams, invented and spent many years developing. The yogurt is creamy and indulgent, yet it doesn’t have any fat what’s so ever.
Williams and Wright described Lick as:
“Lick aims to become the leading face of frozen yogurt in the UK, Europe and beyond. Our tubs are available in Sainsbury’s Locals (210 stores), Sainsbury’s Supermarkets (325 stores – up from 250 last year) Waitrose (95 stores), Ocado, Yo!Sushi, Budgens, Londis, Wholefoods, Planet Organic, Picturehouse Cinemas, Holiday Inn and loads of independents, delis, cinemas, restaurants, offices, schools and universities all over the UK.
“We plan to begin exporting this year and already have significant interest from several potential European customers. We believe we have only realized a small part of Lick’s potential, but have achieved enough so far to have complete confidence that our product and brand is the absolute best in the market.”
The funds collected from this campaign will be used to support growth with major retail partners, trade marketing, building brand awareness and new product innovations.
During a recent interview with Waitrose Weekend, Williams shared details about him and Wright’s frozen yogurt adventure:
“We began selling frozen yogurt when we were 16. We made it at home and solid it from a vintage tricycle ice cream cart on our local beach in Tenby during the summer holidays.
“We eventually came up with one of the world’s first frozen yogurts made from 100 percent yogurt. A lot of other manufactures combine their yogurt with ice cream, but all of our products are fat-free and have no artificial flavorings or additives and in 2013 Lick was voted the UK’s favorite frozen yogurt.”
Wright and Williams revealed to Insider about how their small company has gown significantly over the past few years and why they decided to turn to the equity crowdfunding platform for help:
“We want to continue on this path and to do so need to invest in working capital, new people, [product development] and marketing. We can really feel the momentum building behind Lick and want to make the most of the opportunity by taking on investment now.”
The frozen yogurt duo also discussed their new “soft serve” frozen yogurt product, which is set to launch this spring:
“We are in talks with several European distributions about exporting our tubs and see a large part of our soft serve yogurt sales coming in Europe, the Middle East and Asia from where we have already received lots of interest.”
In regards to the company’s future, the owners added:
“This summer we are planning to open pop-up shops in Brighton, London, and beyond. We will be at lots of music festivals and events with our trike and soft serve machine and aim to get branded Lick soft serve machines in to some high profile restaurants/grab-and-go sites.”
Since its debut on Crowdcube, Lick’s campaign has raised over £55,000 from nearly 140 investors. It is set to close on April 30th.
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