The History of Ice Cream in Thailand
There’s no certain evidence at what time accurately Ice Cream’s first introduced to Thailand. It is believed
that Ice cream was first imported from Singapore to Thailand a hundred years back in late King Rama IV to King Rama
The 5th period. And Ice cream was then primarily served as a royal dish.
The Pop, the first ice cream manufacturer in Thailand, imported ice cream machinery from overseas and generated considerable amount of ice cream using the brand name Ped or Duck in English. They had paid considerable concentration to the quality and purity in the manufacturing process.
At that moment, the Thais called ice cream “I-Tim”. Initially, The Pop’s Ice cream or I-Tim was not in fact an ice cream mixture as we’d recognize now but instead was syrup mixed with ice.
Soon after, several flavors, let’s say, Lod Chong (rice noodles made of rice eaten with coconut cream), O lieng (Thai black coffee), Black bean, Chao Guay (a sort of Chinese vegetable jelly black in color) et cetera had been added.
Then, they developed their Ice cream blend into ice lolly and adding color such as red, green, pink alsoorange mixed with several tasty flavors of syrups.
Shortly after, The Duck Ice Cream became a top hit dessert for sweet-toothed consumers, in particular young children.
In 1977, the very first ice cream shop presented by Friesland Foods under the brand “Foremost”. It acquired a great deal of popularity amongst young adults.
At the moment, ice cream and related frozen desserts consumption in Thailand is still high. And there are actually few main competitors, like, Swenson’s, in the market. Hence there’s still options for new operators to enter the market.
