Frozen aisle slotting fees cost small ice cream brands $9K-$500K

A new ice cream brand trying to get shelf space in grocery stores faces slotting fees of $250-$1,000 per SKU per store for small chains, scaling to $9,000+ for a single regional chain and up to $500,000 for a national chain like Stop & Shop. Frozen and refrigerated categories have the highest average slotting fees of any grocery category because freezer shelf space is physically expensive to expand and new frozen product introductions are frequent, creating intense competition for fixed space. This means a small ice cream brand needs $30,000-$50,000 just to get into a handful of stores in one chain, with no guarantee of sell-through. If the product does not hit velocity targets in 8-12 weeks, it gets pulled, and the slotting fee is gone. The reason this persists is that retailers bear real risk stocking unproven frozen products (energy costs, opportunity cost of shelf space), and large incumbents like Unilever and Nestle can absorb these fees as marketing costs while small brands cannot.