How is Sides doing after ice cream delisting in Iceland?

The Sidemen’s ice cream hit Iceland in February to much fanfare. Developed with Beechdean Dairies, it had debuted in the influencers’ fried chicken chain, Sides.

Sides food director Gordon McDermott said the response from diners had been “phenomenal”. “We had people buying tubs and tubs like they were in a shop,” he said. A grocery rollout seemed a logical next step.

But last week, The Grocer revealed the ice cream range had disappeared from Iceland.

So, why didn’t it last? How are the Sidemen’s other food and drink ranges faring? And how does grocery factor into Sides’ growth plans?

The initial signs were all ­positive. “The British ice cream industry needs this,” said Beechdean Dairies MD Andrew Howard at the time of the Iceland launch. “We haven’t seen a product and brand innovation like this for a very long time.” On top of the Iceland listing, Beechdean signed up three distributors in the UK across foodservice and convenience. Plus, the tubs were listed on rapid delivery apps.

“We created the range to complement growth plans,” says Sides CEO Robin Mehta.

Yet in grocery, at least, the ice cream has not performed as well as anticipated. “Freezer space is limited and there are a lot of incumbents,” admits Mehta. “The focus for us has been on foodservice.”

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The 15-strong frozen food range, launched exclusively Iceland in June 2024, seems to have suffered a similar fate. Only eight SKUs remain today.

But this has all been part of a test and learn process, says Mehta. “We agreed to create a range over a two-year period [and] used data to trim that down to products doing well.”

Core focus

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the products “most closely associated with the restaurant” have sold best. As such, Iceland now lists a quartet of chicken lines, three table sauces and one hash browns SKU. “We’re working with a number of manufacturers to deliver more of these core lines,” Mehta says.

At the same time, Sidemen is still operating outside that core. Sides jerky, manufactured by New World Foods, hit 3,000 Tesco stores on a ‘when it’s gone it’s gone’ (WIGIG) basis in April 2024. It returned to the supermarket permanently in July 2025, rolling into Express stores earlier this month.

Meanwhile, Sides’ nascent iced coffee range arrived in July. It is being distributed in the UK by United Food Brands, which made a “seven-figure order” last month, according to Mehta.

It may seem like a scattergun approach – but in fact, it’s all part of a strategy to suit a brand built on social media.

“We’re not coming at [grocery] from a place of starting a brand, building it up slowly and building that hype,” says the Sidemen manager Jordan Schwarzenberger. “We’re coming in with an immense amount of demand, and then we have to see what sticks.”

Mehta cites the launch of Best Cereal in March 2024 as a key learning curve. It debuted in Tesco on a WIGIG basis, with an rsp of £2 for 375g – selling 500,000 packs in three months.

Despite doing “phenomenally well in Tesco”, it was never permanently listed, “mainly due to our own naivety”.

“We didn’t understand that pricing a product too low didn’t give the retailer enough margin,” Mehta admits.

It’s now learning in retail, and continues to have growth ambitions in the sector. But Sides is “first and foremost a restaurant brand”, stresses Mehta.

That focus was demonstrated by the appointment of QSR veteran Aaron Moore-Saxton as Sides MD in June. Sides also unveiled a “major revamp” of its restaurant menu this month, allowing customers to choose the spiciness and format of their chicken order, as it set out plans to “own the hot chicken category in the UK”.

So the message is clear: for the Sidemen, grocery is the side, not the main.