There are many varieties of snow cone flavors to choose from.
When choosing shaved ice flavors, it’s not only important to know what the basic standards are, but it’s also important to know all about the wide variety of snow cone flavors that are available. Not every flavor is going to do well at every location, which is part of what makes local testing so important, but it’s a safe bet that when people go to buy a couple of snow cones, they do have some expectations for basic flavors of snow cones that are going to be available to choose from.
Some of the most basic and popular flavors that people are going to expect from a shaved ice vendor include cherry, lemon-lime, raspberry, grape, and strawberry. These flavors often make up the backbone of most snow cone sales for vendors, but they are only a starting point. There are other flavors, both common and unique, that are also very popular with some regional vendors such as green apple, banana, root beer, bubblegum, cotton candy, and other similar fun flavors.
What are the most popular shaved ice flavors? This can be a hard question because there are so many different things that go into putting together a good local business. In some areas certain flavors are much more popular or common than in others. Lime is a perfect example. In many southern areas with solid Hispanic cultures you see lime with coke, with water, and in a variety of cooking ? while in many other areas lime is seen as a sour fruit without a lot of taste or use. The location of your snow cone business could determine whether lemon-lime is a good flavor for the area or a bad one.
Testing out flavors is important, because each area is going to be a little different. While it’s a pretty safe bet that cherry, grape, and the other normal basic flavors will always be popular, you might be surprised what works after a little bit of experimenting. Maybe cotton candy and root beer snow cone flavors are great during the entire year, or maybe they tend to work for short times like around the 4th of July. Even if they’re slow sellers, eventually they will sell out and then you’ll know what to buy more of or what to skip.
There are nearly 100 different flavors of shaved ice to choose from depending on which vendors you use to provide you with flavoring syrup for snow cones. These can range from common flavors that you don’t see often in snow cone form like strawberry-kiwi, peppermint, cherry cola, butterscotch, and hot cinnamon; to specialty snow cones with very specific or different flavors like Pina Colada, coconut, dill pickle, fuzzy navel, and strawberry cheesecake.
The sheer number of choices can be intimidating, but this also provides an opportunity to set up a niche set of flavors that you could be the only one to offer. Some shaved ice flavors that are meant to taste like a fruity alcoholic drink like Pina Colada, Fuzzy Navels, Margarita, or Bahama Mamas could be very popular with parents who stop to get shaved ice for their kids and then decide to try one of those flavors for themselves, as well. This could become a very popular and profitable part of any snow cone business, especially as positive word of mouth grows. This isn’t the only good idea when it comes to diversifying flavors, either. You could carry normal flavors and tropical flavors, or rotate a “flavors of the month” combination to get feedback on a wide variety of flavors and figure out which ones could work well for you full time.
When it comes to picking out the right flavors, it’s always a good idea to start with the basics that everyone expects and then to move on and expand from there. In some areas going with the “circus” or “county fair” type of flavors might do well, while other locations are going to do better with tropical flavors or flavors based around alcoholic drinks. Testing is always important, but by knowing the basics and keeping an open mind to new flavors and ideas, any snow cone vendor should be able to come up with the ideal combination of snow cone flavors for their business.