Top Vegan Friendly Hospitality Tips from this InstaFamous Ice Cream Shop in Bordeaux

Learn 3 top vegan hospitality industry best practices from a vegan-friendly ice cream parlour in France. Written by Sophie Downie of Vegan Friendly Bordeaux(Trained and Certified by Vegan Hospitality).

One of the first things you will notice when you stop by Jolly, the vegan-friendly ice cream parlour in the center of Bordeaux, is the warm, friendly and impeccable service. Ophélia Rouillard, the owner, and the team of young women who work with her will always welcome you with a smile and the following sentence : “Bonjour ! Qu’est-ce qui vous ferait plaisir?” I have always loved this way you can ask someone what they would like in French, meaning “ What would make you happy/feel pleasure?”

As for feeling happy, well, as a vegan living in a city which does not yet have an abundance of vegan options available, I can guarantee that at Jolly you will always find something that will make you very happy! As a certified vegan hospitality consultant, my mission is to support restaurants and hotels in providing quality experiences for their guests so they develop a loyal following of next-generation customers.

When I first met Ophélia, I was so impressed by how enthusiastic she was to serve vegan customers that I gave her a few pointers on her labeling and how it would put customers at ease to know at first glance what was vegan. She immediately took out a marker pen and started adding (V)s to the menu and promised there would be more options next time we visited.

Using Jolly’s success as an example, I’m happy to share my top 3 tips for restaurants looking to attract vegan guests:

1) Label your menu: On Jolly’s menu, the different milks available are clearly labeled, oat milk, almond milk, cow’s milk. A glance at the labels for the home made ice creams churning away and you will notice the (V) on almost every single one. Don’t forget to label both your food and drinks menu! Look out for sneaky ingredients — for example, did you know that wines are often processed with animal products, sugar is often processed with bone char, and some orange juice brands add sardine and anchovy oil to market their added omegas?

2) Offer multiple vegan options: Indeed Ophélia makes all the ice creams herself, pistachio, vanilla, coffee, mint, mango, raspberry, chocolate…and out of the 8 flavors available, 7 are vegan. This brings vegans coming back for more, and also means they’ll order multiple scoops to try out all of the flavors! If your restaurant has only one vegan option, you’ll have a hard time attracting repeat visitors.

3) Veganize your best sellers: Ice cream is far from the only vegan item on the menu at Jolly, which boasts waffles, crepes, both sweet and savory, home-made hot chocolate, golden milk, whipped cream….The list goes on and on and all of it has a vegan version.

You may be surprised to learn that Ophélia is not vegan herself. I was curious to find out how and why she had decided to develop so many vegan options, so I asked her, “how did it all start?” 

Ophélia’s husband stopped consuming dairy for health reasons in his early 20s after reading a book on the negative effects of dairy on the human body. Replacing dairy in recipes is something she has been doing for a while and naturally she always had some non-dairy crepe mixture on hand in case her husband stops by for an afternoon snack! 

Not long after she had opened, a vegan blogger was visiting Bordeaux and decided to stop for an afternoon treat and asked her if she had a vegan option on hand, which she did, of course! News travels fast in the vegan community so all it took was one instagram story seen by Bordeaux based vegan food blogger Delphine @geeketbalsamique for the word to spread.

The very next day she and Wilhelm, the owner of the vegan concept store Un Jour Vert, turned up for their “goûter” (French snack time religiously respected by all, even into adult years). Just a few weeks later, vegans all over Bordeaux were sharing pictures on Instagram of their crepes, waffles and ice creams, myself included.

As a vegan hospitality consultant I could spot all the signs that Ophélia was setting herself up for immediate success.  Vegan clients want to know that they can trust the people serving them; that they will be able to tell them with confidence what is in their products. When you order at Jolly, you will always be asked “with cow’s milk or oat milk?”, when it comes to the topping “would you like that vegan?”; the whole experience at Jolly is the very definition of vegan-friendly and so it has naturally become the place to go for vegan locals and vegan tourists in Bordeaux.

Menu labeling and staff training are both services I provide, in addition to menu evaluation, kitchen training and recipe development, to help hospitality businesses gain vegan client’s trust and therefore tap into a new clientèle successfully.

Now Ophélia is very much established as a vegan-friendly spot in Bordeaux, but it’s not only vegan customers who are choosing to have the vegan version. “As we always offer both options, and mention that the taste is the same, a lot of people go for the vegan version because they’re curious. A lot of people also have the vegan version because it’s easier on the stomach,” Ophelia shared. She went on to say: “I’ve had non-vegan customers come back half an hour later with their friends or spouses for them to try too. They often tell me how delicious it was and how they couldn’t believe it was vegan!”. 

As well as making people happy with her delicious options, the financial gains are undeniable: “The girls who work here are always amazed, the vegan customer’s receipt is in general three times that of a traditional customer!” Ophélia tells me, “ Vegan customers now represent 60% of my clientele, up to 90% on certain weekends.”

Ophélia’s passion to serve her customers in the most inclusive way possible is a real success story as her loyal customers continue to grow everyday. I sincerely hope you will be lucky enough to become one of them If you decide to visit Bordeaux!

CLICK HERE to Follow Jolly on instagram, account run by Ophélia Rouillard

CLICK HERE to Follow Sophie Downie @veganfriendlybordeaux on instagram for Vegan Hospitality Consulting in France

CLICK HERE to Follow Vegan Hospitality HQ on instagram for more tips on how to attract and serve vegan guests