Known for making its yoghurts using a double hand-straining method, The Yoghurt Shop opened its first store in Adelaide in 2003 and has been operating as a family business since.
Thank you for reading this post, don't forget to subscribe!The brand has sold more than 25m tubs of yoghurt to date, with its products now stocked at over 4,500 retailers in 11 markets, including China, New Zealand, and Singapore.
In early November, it set foot in the Middle East market through a launch at Tamimi Market, one of the largest supermarket chains in Saudi Arabia.
“We’d been in Asia for a while, so we know how to make connections and how well-liked our products are. Although we weren’t very familiar with the Middle East, we ended up having lots of people from Dubai and Abu Dhabi try our yoghurts at Gulfood in February.
“We also went to Riyadh and visited Tamimi’s office. The partner who met us loved our products and said that there was nothing like this in Saudi Arabia. While consumers in the region do eat a lot of labneh and plain yoghurt, they don’t have flavours like ours,” Brandon Reynolds, Chief Operating Officer of The Yoghurt Shop, told FoodNavigator-Asia.
It took the company around seven months to obtain halal certification and complete registration with the Saudi authorities. As the products are shipped from Australia to all its export markets, the firm also had to work out logistics matters before the official launch.
Reynolds sees positive growth opportunities in the Saudi Arabian market, which he touts as the fastest-growing in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), due to the variety of consumers and an evolving middle class.
“Because of the country’s ambitious growth plans and the number of expats they are bringing in from around the world, the market has a very diverse population. At the same time, the middle class in Saudi Arabia are looking to try new things as they open up to the world, so our yoghurts are a natural fit.
“We’re the most expensive yoghurt in every place we export to, even Singapore, and we know that for people to buy our product, they have to try it first. So, we will be doing in-store free tastings and a couple of launch offers, where there are heavy discounts for one week only, just to give people the opportunity to try our products.”
Additionally, a key selling point is said to be its transparent packaging.
“We are one of the few yoghurts where you can see the content inside the packaging. Traditionally, most yoghurt packaging is opaque and you can’t see through it.
“I think the unique-looking packaging sitting on the shelf, which does not stock too many foreign perishable goods, especially as the locals make a lot of their own yoghurt, is what attracts consumers in this region.”
Besides participating in the Gulfood trade show in February 2025, The Yoghurt Shop will be working with Careem, a Dubai-based app for ride-hailing, food and groceries delivery and more, to provide quick commerce service.
It is also looking to partner with other retailers in the Middle East, such as Lulu, Spinneys and Mega Mart, which have expressed interest.
Asked on further expansion plans, Reynolds revealed that the brand is slated to make its first foray into the North American market in the near future.
“Our team is in Houston now and we’re about to launch in Central Market, a supermarket chain in Texas. Soon, we will be flying our yoghurts from Adelaide to Dallas, and selling them in local supermarkets. We looked at some of our competitors and found that while they are more similar to us [than those in the Middle East], our products are still unique in taste.
“There are other ultra-high end retailers that we can work with in the market. If we could grow a larger footprint, we may look to establish our own premise in the US, where we could take our recipe and brand, and do the opposite of what Chobani did — we would go into America the way they came to Australia.”
Proudly South Australian
According to Reynolds, The Yoghurt Shop’s products, including packaging, are entirely made in Adelaide.
The brand had introduced localised products in the past, such as a red plum yoghurt drink for Hong Kong and a brown sugar yoghurt drink for China. Despite the popularity of these products, it was challenging to use purely South Australian ingredients to make them.
“We realised that the success behind our products is that when people buy our yoghurts, they are buying a piece of South Australian food. And what they want is for a product to be localised to the place where it is produced.
“In fact, we often find consumers who tried our products in Singapore, Malaysia or Thailand sending us messages when they come to Adelaide and buy our yoghurt on a shelf here. They find it exciting to buy a product from its land of origin, even though it’s the same thing.”
As such, The Yoghurt Shop is focusing on brand-building at the moment, without dismissing the idea of starting a new brand that has a localised line-up in the future.
Premium positioning
The Yoghurt Shop’s premium pricing is attributed to two main factors: the craftsmanship and ingredients for production, and the hefty logistics cost of exporting chilled dairy products with a short shelf life.
“The way that we make our products is traditional and cumbersome. We produce what we think is the best yoghurt — it’s thick without the use of artificial thickeners, it’s free from additives and preservatives, and the texture is just right.
“Most of our ingredients come from other family-owned South Australian businesses. Therefore, apart from the cost of flying these products across the globe, the high quality also adds to the pricing,” Reynolds said.
For the brand, it boils down to creating value for discerning consumers who appreciate premium products.
“No matter which your city you are in, there is a similar group of consumers, who are very educated and well-travelled, in the ultra-premium market.
“Although our products are expensive, consumers have been coming back [to repurchase] because they taste good. As long as people are happy and keep consuming our products, we’ll continue making them, and we’ll try to create the best flavours and keep our costs down where we can.”
