Elvaria, a Gainesville, Va.–company that makes commercial ice cream machines, is quietly taking on giant companies in the field such as Taylor, Electrofreeze and Stoelting, and, if you will pardon the pun, licking the competition. Elvaria machines can now be found in 40 states and 6 countries, which isn't bad for a company that started just three years ago.
Consumers don't often think about commercial restaurant equipment when they are enjoying soft-serve ice cream or picking among fifteen flavors from the latest fro-yo shop to pop up in their neighborhood. The technology has become ubiquitous: see the handle? Pull it down and enjoy a tasty treat. But those machines typically run $15,000 each, which could explain why the cost of fro-yo, with its multiple machines, is more than the cost of a cone at the drive-through.
"The industry is ripe for disruption," says Adam Rossi, who became CEO of Elvaria when he purchased it in October of 2013. "There are two or three giant players [Taylor, Electrofreeze and Stoelting] that have been around since World War II. You have to find a local dealer [to get one of their machines], who sets the price. They are quality machines, but you are at the mercy of local distributors and mandatory maintenance contracts."
The price of Elvaria's machines, which are assembled in Gainesville, is on the website. They start at $6,500 each and clients deal directly with the manufacturer. "We offer lifetime support, with a toll-free number that [rings] our factory in Gainesville," Rossi says. Maintenance contracts are optional.
Beyond price, what sets Elvaria's products apart is their intelligence. Rossi spent 13 years running Platinum Solutions, a software and data management company that was
acquired by SRA International in 2010. After buying Elvaria, he built the Gainesville factory, hired new engineers and management staff, and worked on building out the next generation of the machine, which he hopes will "leapfrog the competition" by being smart.
"It's the inevitable result of a software guy buying a simple manufacturing company," Rossi says. The machines essentially have a computer on board and communicate information with owners such as cleaning needs, settings needed for different products (gelato vs. yogurt vs. sorbet), temperature of the freezing chamber and so on.
The products can also run diagnostics on themselves, if, say, a product is runny or a machine sounds loud.
Right now, the smart machines are controlled by microcontrollers, or mini computers. The next generation, which Rossi is working on, will have a smarter computer onboard to allow for remote communication with the factory in Gainesville for troubleshooting. "We're overinvesting in the technology," Rossi says. "But this is the future of big commercial machines."
Want to check out Elvaria's technology in action? Head to
Crave in Vienna, among others.
Elvaria is currently looking for a "true product engineer," says Rossi, with a mechanical or electrical engineering degree.