How Vadilal Gandhi went from selling fountain soda on street to building Rs 1900 crore ice cream empire

Vadilal ice cream is a household brand in India and one of the biggest ice cream companies in the country which is now worth thousands of crores. However, not many people know that the popular ice cream brand started with just a small street soda shop in 1907.

The story of Vadilal ice creams began with the founder of the company Vadilal Gandhi, who opened a small soda shop in pre-Independent India back in 1907. Coming from a middle-class family, Gandhi opened a small fountain soda shop in Ahmedabad.

Unexpectedly, the popularity of Vadilal Gandhi’s soda shop grew exponentially in Gujarat, and he soon combined soda with ice cream, selling ice cream soda pops across the state. Vadilal eventually opened its first ice cream outlet in the country in 1926.

The business was passed on to Vadilal Gandhi’s son Ranchod Lal Gandhi, who imported an ice cream machine from Germany before Independence to expand the family business. Later run by Ranchod Lal’s two sons Ramchandra and Laxman Gandhi, there were 10 total Vadilal outlets in Ahmedabad in the 1970s.

Over the years, the small fountain soda shop run by Vadilal Gandhi has now expanded into a massive ice cream business, which has a market cap of over Rs 1933 crore, according to The Economic Times.

Apart from being a leading ice cream brand in India, Vadilal also prides itself on being a purely vegetarian company and has expanded its business into processed food, selling pre-cooked curries, bread, and other vegetarian items.

Kalpit Gandhi is the fifth generation businessman from the Vadilal family and is the current Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of the ice cream and processed food company. Now, Vadilal has also emerged as the largest-selling Indian ice cream brand in the United States.

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