Orange Leaf Offers A Twist On Frozen Yogurt

At the new frozen yogurt shop Orange Leaf on Fruitville Road, the name is funny but the taste of you'll experience is not.

"We should have a contest for why they came up with that name," owner Mike Bess of Sarasota said jokingly. "I don't know if [the founder] had an orange leaf in his back yard or what." 

It could be a stretch for an Oklahoma City-based chain, but an Orange Leaf is right at home in Florida. 

The chain was actually conceived in San Francisco and later moved its corporate offices to the Sooner State with CEO Reese Travis, who won a championship in 2000 with University of Oklahoma football. 

The froyo chain is undergoing a rapid expansion across the country, and in Southwest Florida including one here in Sarasota. Last year, Orange Leaf had 48 stores and now with current and future stores this year is expected to top 200, Bess said. The Sarasota store opened April 4.

Bess is no stranger to Florida. He lived in Orlando for nine years and met his wife there and his kids were here. The family would come down to Bradenton Beach and along the coast line and fell in love with the area and settled  just north of the Manatee County line in Sarasota. 

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But the taste — there's no hint of sour, no funny aftertaste from the froyo. That is what sets the yogurt apart, Bess said, from the very competitive yogurt market in Sarasota. 

"I've tried a ton of different products, and before I went with this, I wanted to try the one that was the absolute best, and that's why I went with Orange Leaf," Bess said. 

When the sweet tooth crowd files in, they'll notice a bright, and appropriately, orange interior with a wall splash and you almost feel like you're in the Netherlands with all the orange and modern looking furniture and logo to match.

Orange Leaf embraces the popular self-serve yogurt style and uses a 16 ounce and 24 ounce size cups and a waffle cone can be inserted to the cup. 

Yogurt lovers will find eight machines containing 16 flavors that will rotate, including a new mystery flavor to be unveiled soon. Between a set of two flavors there's a middle lever to create a twist.

"Let's say you have vanilla and coffee side by side, and you want to twist it in the middle? You can," Bess said.

Some folks combine four or five flavors while others go solo.

"The biggest key is that you're your own master of your dessert," Bess said.

You can add as much or as little as you like in the cup, and remember, there's toppings to add — 16 candies and 16 fruit toppings.

It's all paid by the ounce — 49 cents per ounce. Folks loading up on 16 ounce cups filing in on a recent Monday varied from $2.87 to $3.75 for their yogurt. 

For the committed orange leaf fans, there is also a rewards card where points are awarded to earn discounted ounces and free yogurt. 

Bess spent 15 years in the agriculture industry, including time for the Florida Fruit and  and seven years in the construction industry. One day while living in Springfield, Missouri, Bess and his daughters stopped in an Orange Leaf that just opened in town.

"We loved trying it, and making it the way we liked," Bess said. "We just fell in love with it."

His devotion to agriculture could probably explain his choice of milk. All Orange Leafs use fat free milk in their yogurts save for the Dole Pineapple — a must try — which is lactose free. 

But at the Sarasota location, Dakin Dairy Farms from Myakka City is used. The cows are grass fed there and has little distance to travel from utter to store.

"I thought if the cows were milked today, there's a good chance that I could get yogurt that was really, really fresh," Bess said.

The fruit is picked in Florida during peak season for strawberry and blueberries, Bess said. Other fruits offered include kiwi, blackberries and pineapple.

"We get fresh pineapple, we cut it," he said. "It's not out of a can."

Orange Leaf's website touts that its froyo has been tested for gluten and has a 10 parts per million threshold, below the 20 parts per million defined by the FDA. (A list of gluten free yogurt and other key allergy-inducing ingredients are found to the right of this story.)

But it's not all just yogurt and toppings. Bess wants to create a community feel and inviting experience. 

Bess is also committing to rewarding kids as recently he ran a promotion to reward students with A's on their report cards with a free second ounce. Also, he helped Mision Mexico Childrens Refuge Tapachula, which provides a safe place for orphaned, abandoned, abused and disadvantaged children. For every card brought to the shop for the promotion with purchase of a 16 ounce cup, the store donated $1 to the orphanage.

Orange Leaf also welcomes private parties, according to its website. 

So far, Orange Leaf has been well received, and it's "very possible" another store could open in the area, but it would have to be a solid business decision to make that commitment when the time comes, Bess said.

Orange Leaf

5360 Fruitville Road, Sarasota (Located beside Target)

Hours: 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. Sunday through Thursday, Friday-Saturday 11 a.m. to 11 p.m.

Website: OrangeLeafYogurt.com

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Orange-Leaf-Sarasota/231080763631701

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