Retail Spotlight: La Newyorkina

Their Success…While temperature and humidity levels are at its extremes in New York City, New Yorkers and tourists alike are taking their spare time along the highline. The highline boasts as an iconic glimpse into the past and present of New York City where people can indulge in both nature and the city’s skylines on a historic walkway. A common thread for people walking the highline is that people are looking for ways to escape the summer heat. It is almost inevitable for people to not seek a fresh, cold relief. La Newyorkina utilizes this demand and conveniently stands on 30^th St. and 17^th St. attracting many consumers with their ice pop cart. La Newyorkina serves paletas, a traditional Mexican ice pop, in an array of flavors that change seasonally. They have both regular sized paletas, at $4, and mini sized paletas, at $1. The mini sized paletas is a popular choice for children as the “regular sized” paletas are deemed to run a lot bigger than an average ice pop.

Their clean crisp white cart exacerbates the fresh and clean vibes of the product, which identifies with consumer demands after a long, hot sweaty walk on the highline. Moreover, La Newyorkina doesn’t hesitate to brand their cart and their menu board with their logo and their Mexican themed ice pop. While other vendors do exist, these vendors have aligned themselves next to each other, making consumer options broader, which potentially draw customers away. However, La Newyorkina distinguishes themselves and locates themselves in a similar area, where traffic is heavy, but still distancing themselves to be noticed. La Newyorkina is a stand-alone cart with no seats like other vendors offer so most consumers buy a paleta and continue their walk on the highline. This creates more opportunity for more customers. As people walk down the highline those who already have a paleta in hand are already cooling down and indulging in their ice pop, which draws attention to those who are dehydrated and hot. These consumers are potentially persuaded to attain their own ice pop to help them survive the walk, and because La Newyorkina stands at both ends of the highline, the paletas will be easily accessible to new consumers.

Take Aways…La Newyorkina doesn’t fail to attract consumers and create traffic. La Newyorkina is on target with consumer demands during the summer months, and is on trend with consumer eating behavior. Many consumers are seeking for fresh and healthy foods, and La Newyorkina boasts their paletas to be fresh and local. Their ice pops are sourced from NY farmers and nearby organic dairy, fruits and herb vendors. Ingredients that cannot be acquired locally like tamarind, and other Mexican ingredients are imported in by small producers in Mexico. Moreover, Fany Gerson, Founder of La Newyorkina, hand-makes her products from scratch in small batches.

La Newyorkina offers a healthy satisfaction in an array of unique flavors- Hibiscus, Cucumber Lime, Fresh Coconut, Avocado, Tamarind, Horchata, Cajeta, and Mango-Chile. These unique flavors are, ultimately, a leading factor to their success as it attracts consumers through multiple platforms- social media, by-standers.