Rollick Ice Cream

THE COMPANY BEFORE

Rollick’s own website describes a brand born in Kolkata, with carts bringing frozen treats into neighbourhoods. The Times of India identifies its owner as Prestige Ice Cream. That local presence matters to the story: Rollick was not entering eastern India for the first time when the crisis arrived. It already had customers, distribution relationships and a regional identity.

Khemani took over his father-in-law’s business in 2014, according to Mint. He had been working in Dubai and had completed an MBA at INSEAD. Returning to Kolkata meant moving from a corporate career into direct responsibility for an owner-managed enterprise. Mint reports that he sold his house and car and invested in the business.

The starting turnover was around ₹20 crore. Within four years, his account puts it at ₹75–80 crore. Production, stock, distribution and cash flow now belonged to the same management problem. A growing order book could not be separated from the capability to make, store and deliver the product.

Those figures describe the business’s early growth under Khemani. The turnaround itself came later, after the pandemic interrupted that trajectory.

THE CRISIS

Lockdown restrictions disrupted demand and the sales channels on which Rollick depended. Inventory remained while loan repayments continued. Mint’s account places 250–300 families among those depending on the business, making the consequences wider than the owner’s own financial position.

There was also a category-specific problem. In March 2021, director Anisha Aggarwal told The Times of India that rumours about consuming ice cream during and after lockdown had created challenges. A product could be available and still face reluctance from the customer.

For an owner-manager, this combination changes the question. It is no longer just “How do we sell more?” It becomes “Where can we restore dependable sales without committing resources we cannot afford to lock up?” New territories require retailers, storage, transport and service before demand is certain. Existing territory offers a base from which to rebuild.

This is an operational and revenue-recovery story. The sources reviewed do not establish insolvency, a formal debt restructuring or a quantified return to profitability. Those would be different claims, and should not be inferred from a rebound in turnover.

THE LEADERSHIP DECISION

Mint describes Rollick concentrating on eastern India rather than spreading resources across a wider geography. It already understood that market and had a distribution presence there. The strategic change was not to stop being ambitious; it was to put ambition behind an existing commercial advantage.

For ice cream, geography is an operating commitment, not merely a coloured area on a sales map. A retailer needs stock that arrives in saleable condition and can be replenished reliably. Expansion creates obligations throughout that chain. The business lesson is to distinguish the size of an opportunity from the cost of serving it.

Rollick’s choice suggests a useful test for recovery planning: which customers can the business serve well with the capabilities it already has? Strengthening that base can be more valuable than announcing a larger footprint before the supporting operation is ready.

THE ROUTE BACK TO THE CUSTOMER

Contemporaneous reporting shows how the company was thinking about access to demand. On 6 March 2021, The Times of India reported plans for small takeaway counters in Kolkata that would also act as cloud kitchens for delivery pick-up. The group also planned to increase pushcarts to reach more lanes and neighbourhoods.

These were practical channel choices: customers could collect, delivery partners could pick up, and carts could bring the product nearer to the buyer. The report discussed flavours such as Shahi Rabdi and new kulfi offerings, connecting the range to familiar sweet preferences.

TOI also reported a packaged-drinking-water venture, Vida, launched to help the group through the pandemic period. The available reporting does not quantify its contribution to Rollick’s recovery, so it should be treated as a reported diversification initiative rather than a proven explanation for the later turnover milestone.

The 2021 channel announcements are evidence of the response being pursued at the time, not proof that every planned counter or pushcart was subsequently deployed. What they do establish is a focus on making the product accessible as demand returned.

THE DECISION THAT DID NOT NEED A COURTROOM

One episode in Mint’s account makes the management lesson unusually concrete. A landlord was withholding Rollick’s stock. Khemani considered legal action. An entrepreneur in his ASCENT peer group suggested resolving the dispute through a settlement, recovering the goods and moving on.

Khemani followed that advice, paid to settle and recovered the stock. The report does not disclose the settlement amount or quantify the financial benefit. There is no basis for inventing a saving. The documented outcome is narrower and still useful: the goods were recovered without prolonging the dispute.

The lesson is not that a business should surrender its rights. It is that legal merit and commercial priority are different questions. Under pressure, a founder needs to consider time, recoverable value and management attention alongside the strength of a claim. Peer advice helped Khemani examine the problem from another angle; the decision remained his.

THE NEXT CAPABILITY

Surviving an interruption is one task; making the next stage less dependent on the founder is another. Mint reports that Harsh Mariwala encouraged Khemani to think a year ahead about the business’s priorities and begin preparing for them.

The profile gives a specific example of internal development: an employee who joined around 2000 as an assistant accountant later came to lead procurement and manufacturing. It illustrates the possibility of building wider operational responsibility from inside the organisation, rather than treating every new requirement as a problem only the owner can solve.

That is an important companion to regional focus. A business needs both a clear choice about where to compete and people capable of delivering on that choice.

THE RESULTS

By the time of Mint’s October 2026 profile, Khemani said Rollick had crossed ₹200 crore in turnover. The reported sequence is around ₹20 crore when he took over in 2014, ₹80 crore in 2019, ₹35 crore in 2020, and later more than ₹200 crore.

The last figure is a management-reported milestone, not an independently audited result established by this article. Mint does not identify the financial year in which it was crossed. Turnover is not profit, and the reviewed sources do not provide a comparable profit or debt series.

Even with those boundaries, there is a clear recovery to examine. Rollick rebuilt revenue after a severe demand shock while concentrating on its established region. The useful story is not an unsupported claim of financial perfection. It is the sequence of operating choices made under pressure.

THE PLAYBOOK MOVE

Rebuild from the market you can serve reliably: prioritise established customer relationships, restore access to demand, and evaluate disputes by their commercial consequences as well as their legal merits.

SOURCE NOTES

Research checked on 31 October 2026. The principal recovery account is Mint’s 30 October 2026 profile, part of Changemakers of Bharat, an editorial partnership between ASCENT Foundation and LiveMint. Its turnover figures and personal recollections are attributed to Gaurav Khemani; they have not been independently audited for this story.

The Times of India’s 6 March 2021 report supplies contemporary context on proposed channels, products and diversification. Rollick’s own website supplies brand-origin context. This narrative is an original synthesis and business interpretation of those sources; no private interview with the company was conducted.