As the UK has sweltered in record temperatures ice cream sales have soared but there are some missing from the freezer aisles that many would like back
Many have been turning to ice lollies and ice cream to cool down(Image: Getty)
The current heatwave has seen many of us heading to the freezer to dig out treats to cool us down. Figures from June 2026 show summer sales are significantly up with NIQ data revealing ice cream value sales rocketed by 87.9% and volumes jumped 93.2% year-on-year.
But while there are dozens of different ice creams and ice lollies currently on sale many more have been consigned to the rubbish heap. Over the years many have been loved and lost leaving fans craving for their return. Many were once household names such as the Funny Feet pink foot-shaped creation through to the Strawberry Mivvi.
YouTube channel RetroSpectives has pulled together some of its favourites from the past. Here are 21 of them – how many of them do you remember?
1: Lord Toffingham
This was hailed to be “a wizard wheeze from Walls” when it was around in the 1970s. A caramel ice cream, chewy toffee centre and chocolate-dipped which the advert promised was “a perfect confection for a hot day”. Long discontinued, it even has a Facebook group calling for its return.
2: Strawberry Mivvi
This classic British ice lolly featured a sweet strawberry-flavoured ice outer shell wrapped around a creamy vanilla ice cream core. Originally produced by Lyons Maid, it became a nostalgic favourite of the 1960s, 70s, and 80s. Today there are many copies of the treat with almost every supermarket having its own version.
3: Favourite Centres
This was a range of ice lollies including the Toffee Crumble – often remembered for its advert featuring two nuns, one played by Sue Pollard, who said she ‘couldn’t resist’ the ice lolly, before heading back to the theatre to perform in The Sound of Music. Others in the Lyons Maid line were Triple Choc, Choc Mint and Coconut Flake.
4:
This Lyons Maid ice lolly was pretty much frozen plain orange juice on a stick but popular with many. Launched in 1954 it had a long run, spanning seven decades, before being discontinued in 2021.
5: Dinosaurs
Launched in 1974 by Lyons Maid, Dinosaurs were vanilla and chocolate ice cream on a stick. The novelty ice cream/ice lollies were moulded into a dinosaur shape and sold at the time for 8p.
6: The Incredible Hulk
This multi-layered fruit-flavoured ice lolly included a free collectible action card inside every wrapper. The Walls creation was launched in the late 1970s when the Lou Ferrigno TV series was at its peak but phased out in 1982-83 as the televiosn show wound down.
7: Lolly Gobble Choc Bomb
Launched in 1974 by Lyons Maid, this strawberry flavoured ice lolly contained a chocolate bar before then being dipped in chocolate the covered in multi-coloured chocolate balls. It was 6p and loved by many but phased out in the 1980s.
8: Space 1999
Another Lyons Maid offering which came with a picture card was the Space 1999 – which was described as “icy lime flavoured outside, oozy red centre” – although the packaging said it was lime, vanilla and strawberry flavour. The was launched during the summer heatwave of 1976 but was discontinued shortly after.
9: Funny Feet
Walls Funny Feet were launched in the 1980s. The iconic pink foot-shaped strawberry-flavoured ice cream lollies were sold with the help of bright and breezy advert featuring a lot of different feet, telling viewers: “the greatest feet are the ones you eat”.
They were a staple in the 1980s and early 90s but phased out quietly, making a couple of brief return but these were only temporary.
10: Haunted house
Another Lyons Maid offering, Haunted House first went on sale in July 1973 at the price of 4p. The ice cream was white, with a picture of one of eight horrors – Frankenstein’s Monster, a spook, a skeleton, a spider and web, some bats, a wicked witch and a creature – printed on it in edible ink. The pictures were pink, orange, red, green or blue, but you only knew what you had when you opened the wrapper.
11: Zoom
Lyons Maid introduced its Zoom lollies in 1963 priced 6d. Shaped like a rocket, with lime, lemon and strawberry flavours place in horizontal stripes of colour they had picture cards inside wrappers for first time.
After being phased out decades ago, they returned for a brief one-month limited run at Morrisons in May 2019 following a fan campaign, but left shelves again immediately after. Today, generic rocket-style lollies exist, but the brand-name Zoom is unavailable.
12: Cola Rola
Another Lyons Maid treat, Cola Rola was what its name said – a cola flavoured ice lolly. It went on sale in 1971 priced 2p and exceeded its sales targets by 86%. It was quietly phased out towardss the end of the 20th century.
13: Count Draculas Secret
This black cola-flavoured ice covering yellow ice cream with a blood-red frozen jelly core. Often confused with a different treat simply named ‘Dracula’ it has also had a number of other names including Count Dracula’s Deadly Secret, Count Dracula, and eventually just Dracula. It was popular in the mid 70s but phased out by a decade later.
14: Mr Men
Lyons Maid’s Mr Men lollies were all about the wrapper and the stick – each came with a joke imprinted on the stick while there were multiple versions of the wrapper to get your hands on. The mixed fruit flavour lollies launched in 1974 for 4p. They evolved thourh the years but were gone by the mid 1980s.
15: Apple Jack
This one was for adults as Lyons Maid added Herefordshire cider to the lolly. It was made during the 1960s and 70s but has long gone after being discontinued in the 1990s.
16: Magic Monster Lolly
This novelty offering from Walls was launched around 1979-80, featuring a heat sensitive window on its wrapper that revealed a hidden monster portrait (such as Frankenstein’s Monster, Dracula, or the Wolfman) as it warmed up out of the freezer. It was discontinued however by the early 1980s.
17: The Cider Barrel
The Cider Barrel, aslo known as Cider Quench, was popular in the 1970s and 80s. Lyons Maid used Bulmer’s Cider in the treat making it even more enticing for kids. It was another that gradually disappeared from the supermarket freezer aisles.
18: BA (Mr T)
A solid block of cola ice moulded into the shape of the A Team’s Sergeant Bosco Albert B.A. Baracus – also known as Mr T. Released in 1983 it lasted less than a decade befoe being phased out but the Walls carefully crafted design lives on in many memories.
19: Cola Quench
Similar to the Cider Quench this was a stick of pure iced cola lolly. Marketed as “a drink on a stick” by the manufacturer, Lyons Maid, it was popular in the 70s and 80s before disappearing during the 1990s.
20: Screwball
Screwballs were ice cream in an iconic cone-shaped cup which had a hard chewing gum ball at the base. They appeared in the 1970s when they were massively popular. While the original ones disappeared from the freezers some own-brand ones remained available however these have also pretty much disappeared.
21: Fat Frog
The Fat Frog ice lolly, which was made by HB Ice Cream, was a vibrant green lolly flavoured with apple and line and in the shape of a frog. It was originally phased out following its 1990s peak, though it made a brief, limited return for the summer of 2012 after massive public campaigning before disappearing from freezers again.