Andrew Howard: Beechdean’s pedal-to-the-metal ice cream man

Not many fmcg founders end an interview by showing you their tank. But then, Andrew Howard isn’t your typical founder. While removing the tarpaulin covering his FV103 Spartan, he confesses he’s “always wanted a tank” – and has used it to take clients on farm tours.

It’s all par for the course for the self-confessed “northerner with a chip on my shoulder”, who seems to revel in the eccentric. Aside from his work on Beechdean ice cream – which he founded with wife Susie in 1989 – he’s also won two British GT motor racing championships, competed in the Le Mans 24-hour race and been chairman of Wycombe Wanderers FC.

One thing is clear: Howard doesn’t do business in the traditional way. While most founders live in fear of delistings from major grocers, Beechdean itself “delisted” M&S as an own-label partner in October to concentrate on other areas of the business.

“If you want to know what’s wrong with our industry, it’s not built on product quality or trust. It’s dictated by numbers and accountants”

That bold approach hasn’t dented its success. Beechdean now turns over £32m with operating profit of just over £900k. Its own-label division – which involves partnerships with Aldi, Asda, Morrisons and Iceland – is still going strong, making up about 55% of the business. So strong, in fact, that it’s been nominated for Own-Label Supplier of the Year at this year’s Grocer Gold Awards.

Things haven’t always been this easy. Howard recalls “losing 85% of our business in six minutes” during Covid, when turnover plummeted from £22m to £3m. Tears prick his eyes as he recounts the family’s resilience during that time. And he’s eternally grateful to an Aldi director who made sure Beechdean was paid everything “within two hours” to help with cashflow.

“How insane is that? So, does she get my loyalty? Of course she gets my loyalty,” Howard says.

On the flip side, the business stopped working with three or four customers who were “horrible” at that time. “We as a family sat down and said: ‘Do we want to deal with those people after Covid? No.”

Ultimately, the pandemic drove “a reset” that has made the business “more focused” and better than ever, Howard says.

Indeed, today’s Beechdean boasts a diverse portfolio. On top of its own-label offer, it sells impulse tubs under the Beechdean brand to theatres and leisure sites, works with the likes of Brakes and Eden Farm on the foodservice side and is having “a lot of success” with medium-sized QSR groups.

One of its highest-profile deals to date is with YouTube collective The Sidemen. Beechdean started manufacturing the Sides ice cream range for their casual dining chain – also called Sides – in December, before launching into retail with Iceland in February.

“We’re very successful in retail own label, but we’ve never been successful in retail brand,” says Howard. “The problem is, in the retail environment, those cabinets are so controlled. How the hell are you going to get a product in there?

“You need a brand that’s going to be powerful enough to get to the consumer,” he adds. “We felt that if we coupled our own-label experience with the brand presence of The Sidemen, surely that was a model for success.”

The resulting products – 500ml tubs in six flavours as well as an eight-strong impulse range – have made their mark. The range has gone “massive, just insane” in foodservice and enjoyed “huge success” with independent retailers. Next on the cards are the larger retailers he’s hoping to crack in 2026. Although there’s “still a nervousness” around getting listings, Howard is a firm believer in the quality of the range.

“The products are sensational. And as an ice cream maker, you just want to make shit-hot products,” he says. “Ice cream is an adventure. And working with The Sidemen, we got to play on boundaries. All of the products go through the lads, and I like their disruptive, anarchic attitude.”

For Howard, it’s a particularly exciting opportunity in a branded market that’s “heavily controlled and very well managed by two players”: Froneri and Unilever.

“Let’s not get that wrong, they’re doing a fantastic job,” he stresses. “But if you want to know what’s wrong with our industry, it’s not built on product quality or trust. Our industry is built on EBITDA. It’s still dictated – as it should be, I get this – by numbers and accountants, so the days of taking risk within retail are gone.”

Still, Beechdean can’t afford to ignore the numbers altogether. Particularly when they’re adding up to a difficult set of circumstances. Input costs – sugar, dairy, cocoa and energy – are spiking. At the same time, volumes across the category fell by 3.2 million litres last year [NIQ 52 w/e 7 September 2024]. Amid all these challenges, Howard is determined not to “be greedy”.

“We don’t want to rule the world,” he says. “What we want is to have a factory that makes between £30m and £50m, so everyone involved can have a lifestyle and ‘stuff the mattress’. And I know it’s a really basic principle, but don’t buy things if you can’t afford them. Don’t commit to things if you can’t afford them. And don’t promise things if you can’t deliver them.”

Willy Wonka factory

The first step toward meeting Howard’s key financial target – to hit circa £50m in sales in the next five years – will be completing a new factory-cum-development centre in Cheshire. It will be, in his words, “a proper Willy Wonka factory”.

The idea is to have somewhere “we can really start stretching our legs” and delivering ice cream “that makes consumers go: ‘Oh my god, what have you done to me?’” he says.

The company has also invested £4m into a new machine that will ramp up production capabilities for 500ml tubs from 125 to 400 a minute. Such speeds will put Beechdean closer to the industry giants, even with the caveat that “we’re just a pimple on the arse of Froneri, so as long as he doesn’t scratch it, we’re fine”.

Read more:

• Sidemen launch Sides ice cream into grocery through Beechdean tie-up

• Where’s Wonka when you need him? Ice cream category report 2025

The upwards trajectory means Beechdean is approached with investment opportunities – or even a buyout proposition – “probably once every two months”, he estimates. “It’s all very flattering,” Howard says. “And we’ve sat at home with a big cheque, figuratively, going: What do we do?

But at its heart, Beechdean is a fiercely independent family business. “The independence is critical to us,” Howard stresses. “We’ve got morals and principles.”

Perhaps unsurprisingly for a man whose wood-beamed office houses 50-plus motor racing trophies, Howard is aiming for the very top. “We’re trying to upset Ben and Jerry’s, categorically,” he says. “When I went into Wycombe Wanderers, the marketing guy asked me what I wanted him to do. I said: ‘Make Wycombe famous.’

“Our job now is to make Beechdean famous. There are no real Davids against the Goliaths at the moment, right?” Howard concludes. “And somebody needs to walk on to the battlefield with a sling and be prepared to lob a few rocks around.”