Partnership
Put it on your counter
Nineteen rooms currently pour Marlow — cafés, two cinemas, three hotels and a wine bar that serves the sorbet with the cheese. We add two or three a year, slowly, and everything you need to decide whether yours should be one of them is on this page rather than behind a form.
What we pack
Shelf life is at a steady −18°C and assumes the door is not being opened forty times an hour. Warmer than that, halve it.
| Format | What it is | Per case | Shelf life | Minimum |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 90 g cup | Single serve, sealed, spoon under the lid | 24 | 10 weeks | 2 cases |
| Lolly, 90 g | Dipped or plain, on a birch stick | 40 | 12 weeks | 2 cases |
| Mochi, 75–80 g | Wrapped singly, boxed in fours | 32 | 5 weeks | 1 case |
| Tub, 1 litre | Sealed for retail and take-home | 6 | 14 weeks | 2 cases |
| Pan, 5 litre | Service only — scooped in your kitchen | 1 | 8 weeks sealed | 4 pans |
| Gift box of 12 | Mixed, with a dry-ice liner | 4 | 6 weeks | 1 case |
We would rather be on one counter that sells out than in ten freezers that do not.
How it works
Tell us about the room
Not the volume — the room. What you serve, when it is busy, and what the freezer is. Two lines is enough, and the form below asks for exactly that.
We bring a plate
Eight things, at your service temperature, in your glassware, within about ten days. You will disagree with us about at least two of them and that is the useful part.
Two cases to start
Roughly ninety units. Small enough that a mistake is cheap and large enough to find out whether your customers come back for a second one.
Then a standing drop
A day and a quantity that repeats until you change it. The flavour list moves with the fruit, so what lands is what was good that week — we send the plan on Thursday.
The whole agreement
There is a contract and it is two pages, most of which is invoicing. These eight points are everything that actually governs the relationship.
What we ask of you
- The price stays ours
- A cup costs the same on your counter as it does on ours. You keep the margin on the sheet, and nobody is punished for buying it in the wrong room.
- The date stamp stays visible
- Do not decant, do not re-wrap and do not cover the base of the lid. The churn date is the only thing standing between us and a nine-month-old cup with our name on it.
- Nothing is scooped from a sealed tub
- Tubs go home sealed. Open service is the 5 litre pan, which is packed for it, and it holds three days once the lid is off.
- You tell us when it is bad
- A grainy batch is a fault at our end and we would rather hear it from you in the week than from a customer in a month. Send the date stamp and we credit the case.
What you get from us
- Everything unsold in eight weeks
- Your first order is fully returnable for eight weeks. If it does not move in your room we credit it in full and take it back on the next run — no restocking fee, no argument about why.
- A freezer thermometer that logs
- Sent with the first delivery. Most freezer failures are slow and invisible; the log is what tells you the door was left open on a Sunday rather than that the ice cream was wrong.
- A tasting before you commit
- We bring a plate of eight to your room, at your service temperature, in your glassware. It takes an hour and it is the only reliable way to find out whether this belongs on your menu.
- The flavour list a week early
- Stockists see the churn plan on Thursday, before it goes on the site. It is enough notice to print a board or write a dessert around whatever the fruit is doing.
- 19Rooms currently pouring
- 2Cases, minimum first order
- 8 wkEverything unsold returnable
- 14Days to first delivery
The six things everyone asks
What does it actually cost?
The trade sheet goes out with the first reply — there is no gate on it and no call to book. Margin runs between 45 and 55% at our retail price depending on format, with the pan at the top of that range because you portion it yourself.
Can we put our own label on it?
No. We have said no to this eleven times and the answer has not moved. We will develop an exclusive flavour with you and name it after your room, which is the version of this that we think is worth doing — minimum one draw, so ninety litres, and about six weeks from the first tasting.
Our freezer only holds −15°C.
Then it will scoop beautifully and it will not keep. At −15°C you have roughly three weeks rather than ten before the texture starts to go, so we would put you on smaller, more frequent drops and probably keep you off the mochi entirely.
Is there an exclusivity radius?
Not a formal one, but we will not put two rooms of the same kind on the same street, and we will tell you who else near you carries it before you order. A cinema and a café two doors apart is fine. Two cafés is not.
Can you deliver outside your regions?
Only as a full courier box with dry ice, which starts to cost more than the ice cream at about six cases. If you are outside the routes, say so in the form and we will be honest about whether it is worth either of our while.
How long before the first delivery?
A fortnight from the tasting, in practice. The limit is not production — it is that we will not add a stop to a van route mid-week, so a new room joins on the next scheduled run for its region.
Deal?
Then fill in the form
It goes to Sam, who reads it the same day and answers within two working days — usually with a question about your freezer, because that is the thing that decides whether this works.
If you would rather not use a form, the number and the address are in the footer and both are answered by a person.