Polite persistence can pay off, especially in business. Just ask Gelatys founder Adolfo Heller Cohen.
After a career as an industrial engineer in Chile, Cohen moved to Miami in 2017 to launch a gelato business. He started with kiosks at a handful of local shopping malls, with the goal of eventually opening 100 retail locations.
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Then, the Covid-19 pandemic hit. Suddenly, malls shut down – and Cohen needed to pivot. He decided to ramp up production at the company's Doral factory and sell the gelato pops directly to grocery stores.
Cohen knew he wanted Whole Foods to be its first customer.
He sent about 20 emails to grocery giant's former regional president for Florida, Juan Nunez, with no response. Then, Cohen saw Nunez was scheduled to travel to Miami's Wynwood neighborhood for an in-person presentation.
"I knew I had to be there," Cohen said. "At the end of the presentation I went and introduced myself, and he knew who I was. He had seen my emails."
Two weeks later, Cohen closed a deal with Whole Foods.
"Everything changed after that," he said.
It was the first deal of many. A few years later, Gelatys products are available in 3,500 retail stores across 26 states. Winn-Dixie, Publix and Target are among the businesses that sell the company's gelato pops, all made in Miami-Dade County.
It wasn't easy to go from retailer to manufacturer. Gelatys developed its own in-house automation equipment to make its gelato pops at large scale and employs engineers to maintain the tech. About half of the manufacturing process is automated and the other half is done by hand, Cohen said.
The company had to tweak its gelato formulations to ensure the bars could retain their shape for at least 30 minutes without melting. That ensures customers can grab one, do their grocery shopping, and then eat the gelato pop when they get home.
"Every ingredient we use has a different freezing point," Cohen said, describing the process. "Finding the right recipe required a lot of experimentation and a lot of gelato eating."
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Gelatys pops, which come in 11 flavors, are sold in branded freezers equipped with video to monitor its stock and follow up when refills are needed. The freezers capture attention as well. Cohen said Gelatys made a connection with Winn-Dixie after a manger noticed one of its freezers in a Whole Foods.
The ice cream market might be full of competitors, but Cohen said he knows he has something unique with Gelatys. The company projects it will comprise about 1% of the novelty market for frozen desserts by 2031. It aims to surpass $100 million in the sales over the next few years and go head-to-head with major brands like Magnum and Popsicle.
"All of our innovation is helping us grow fast and compete with the big Unilever-owned brands," he said.
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