Origins Of Top Businesses: Why Ben & Jerry’s Sells Ice Cream And Not Bagels
This section of our site is called “Origins Of Top Businesses.”
It features interesting facts about the early years of well-known businesses.
These facts are given to you for fun and inspiration.
Fun because how many top businesses started out is really surprising.
Inspiring because it will help you as a business owner see that if they can do it, so can you.
Now for today’s facts:
- Ben & Jerry’s was originally going to be a bagel company.
- Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield ended up changing their minds when they found out how much it would cost to get all the needed equipment for making bagels.
- Instead they decided to split the cost of a $5 correspondence course on ice cream-making from Penn State University.
- Ben Cohen has anosmia (an inability to perceive odors) and so relied on “mouth feel“. That’s why the company has it’s trademarked “chunks” mixed in with their ice cream.
- On May 5, 1978, with a $12,000 investment they opened an ice cream parlor in a renovated gas station in downtown Burlington, Vermont, but they found out they weren’t making any profits. Because of this, they closed down after only two months.
- But they learned a lot and by 1979, began wholesaling pints of ice cream out of Ben’s VW campervan. An the rest, as they say, is history!
Source: TodayIFoundOut.com, BenJerry.com, and Wikipedia
Photo by slgckgc
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