With a $5 ice-cream course under their belt,
Jerry Greenfield and Ben Cohen had no idea
that their business would turn into
one of the largest ice-cream companies in the world.
We're heading to Waterbury, Vermont,
where I'd like to find out how a company can grow so big
and hold on to their ideals and the quality of their ice cream.
How you doing?
-Hey, there.
How are you?
-Good.
I'm Isaac.
-Hi, I'm Sam.
Welcome to the Ben & Jerry's factory.
So, this is the original?
This is the original factory -- 1986.
And in that time, we've opened six factories --
two here in Vermont, one in Nevada...
Henderson, Nevada, and another in Canada.
Our furthest is over in Holland.
-Holland.
Wow.
-Yeah, Holland.
Are you ready to go on a tour?
Yeah, definitely.
In this very room, Ben and Jerry,
themselves taste-tested and created a lot
of those famous flavors you know today.
This is the historic room where all the magic was made.
This is it!
Isn't that cool?
-Cool.
-Yeah.
Are you ready to go eat some ice cream?
Yes.
What's inside of it?
So, this is a fair-trade certified vanilla ice cream
with a chocolate cookie swirl, chocolate chip,
and chocolate, chocolate chip cookie pieces.
Very, very good.
You guys have a great swirl combination going here.
And I like the ratio because it's not completely
masking the vanilla base.
Yeah.
That's still getting a lot of it through.
And this is the Waterbury
Ben & Jerry's production floor.
-Wow.
-So, really kind of cool.
We're making one of our fan favorites today.
Maybe you've heard of it -- Cherry Garcia.
One of our classic and original flavors.
How many pints in one day --
how about in 24 hours -- will you guys pump out?
So, we can typically make anywhere from 300,000
to 400,000 pints a day.
And how many pints do you take home a day?
How many pints do I take home?
-Yeah.
-Three pints a day.
Do you?
Not to mention I can eat all the ice cream
I want at work.
To get a better understanding
of Ben & Jerry's business roots, I'm meeting with C.E.O.,
Jostein Solheim, who has helped run the company since 2010.
What year did Ben & Jerry's start?
Ben & Jerry's was started in 1978,
right down here in Burlington
in a renovated gas station.
They did very quickly realize
that just being in the scoop shop
and waiting for the people to come might not be enough.
So, that's when they bought a reconditioned truck
and Ben hit the road
and started selling in hand-filled pints.
The business started to grow.
They needed to move on to a different premise,
to make more ice cream.
You know, after some years,
they were going to shut down the business
because it actually was going quite well.
And they were saying,
"Holy crap, we're becoming businessmen.
And we don't want to be businessmen."
And in '88, they really formalized the principles
by which we operate still today.
They really democratized the culture very early on.
They basically came up with a three-part mission
to make the absolutely best possible product.
And we are ice-cream makers.
We want to make it in the most natural way.
And we want to make it with the least negative impact
on the environment.
Then there's an economic mission.
We want to be able to invest and grow and expand.
And then, there's a social mission.
And the social mission is we need to have
a positive impact on human rights,
social justice, environmental justice,
through our growth.
What are Ben and Jerry doing right now?
Well, so, both Jerry and Ben
still work for the company, technically.
But they basically are engaged with their issues
that they're passionate about.
But for us, the core is the product.
This product is a pain in the ass to make.
This is truly not assigned to be made industrially.
Our people are committed.
They really are passionate about what we do.
And I think that's why it still works.
But it's not easy.
And now we're up to producing 250 pints a minute.
That's insane.
One of the biggest reasons
these pints are so hard to make
is because they're always going after a perfect, crunchy swirl.
The reason their ice cream is so chunky
is because Ben has anosmia,
which is the lack of smell and taste.
He can only enjoy the texture of food,
so they added larger and larger chunks until he was satisfied.
I want to get a closer look at this operation
from the ground floor, so I'm meeting up with Claire
to walk me through.