it's the early 1960s and two 12-year-old boys called Ben and Jerry are in gym class Ben is arguing with the gym teacher who's telling him he needs to run a mile in under 7 Minutes meanwhile Jerry is struggling so much he faints these two boys were called the slowest fattest kids in class but this led to them becoming friends and little did they know this friendship would lead to a business worth billions of dollars however going into the ice cream business together was neither of their first choices after finishing school Jerry wanted to become a
doctor but he was rejected by over 40 medical schools so he applied to any job vaguely medical and ended up working as a labtech blending cow hearts and mashing them into test tubes it was certainly not what he'd hoped for Ben on the other hand got several menial jobs including becoming a janitor working at McDonald's and scraping food leftovers but Ben was always a hippie at heart and he hated working for a corporation and having a boss and so he tried to make a living from Pottery unfortunately nobody was buying what he was making so
it's fair to say both Ben and Jerry were very unhappy with how their lives were turning out so in 1973 Jerry moved to New York to live with Ben and they started brainstorming what could they do that meant Ben didn't have to bow down to any kind of authority and Jerry wouldn't have to blend organs both Ben and Jerry loved food and their first business idea was to make fresh Bagels however their plan quickly fell apart when they realized the equipment they needed to make bagels cost $40,000 so they pivoted to something they thought would
be cheaper to make ice cream now they had no idea how to actually make ice cream so they enrolled in a $5 course at Penn State so they could learn next they had to come up with a name for the business Ben wanted to call it Josephine's flying machine after a popular song released in 1910 thankfully though Jerry suggested the name Ben and Jerry's which gave the impression of homemade ice cream made by two regular guys and so using their own savings and a $4,000 loan from the bank they started their own ice cream parlor
which would also sell soup and Crepes however the only site they could afford was an abandoned gas station in Vermont where the roof had fallen in and the floor was covered in 4 in of ice it was opposite the city hall park though and they figured the prime location made up for its issues so they moved in and got to work on the world's first Ben and& Jerry's scoop shop given their limited budget they had to keep costs as low as possible so they built their work tables out of the cheapest Lumber they could find
and their equipment came from clearance auctions at failed restaurants meanwhile Ben's Pottery finally came in handy as all of the dishes bowls and cups were homemade by him whilst Ben worked on Renovations Jerry frantically tried to teach himself to make ice cream in a small electric rock salt freezer thanks to the ice cream course he'd done Jerry had nailed the basics but basic ice cream wasn't going to be enough to stand out so using his biochemistry background Jerry experimented with different ingredients to try and perfect their ice cream mix interestingly Ben has a condition called
a nosia which means he has no sense of smell and a severely diminished sense of taste therefore he has to rely on texture and mouth feel to enjoy his food as a result Ben wanted larger fruit and chocolate chunks in the ice cream and more intense flavors no batch was considered satisfactory until he could identify the flavor while wearing a blindfold this meant adding double quantities of ingredients and focusing more on the texture and something that felt more premium and thus Ben's condition actually worked out extremely well for them because it meant they created much
more intense unique flavors and the bigger chunks in the ice cream became part of their style and thus Ben and& Jerry's officially opened their store on May 5th 1978 customers lined up for buy and get onef free ice cream cones and the launch was a success however it was just one small store so neither of them could have possibly predicted what was coming to increase sales Ben and Jerry started hosting an event known as the fall down Festival which featured contests like ice cream eating and still walking they even had a bizarre show they put
on where Ben would lay down with a cinder block on his stomach and Jerry would attempt to smash it with a sledgehammer thankfully he never missed and the block always shattered into pieces the events like this they put on earned a lot of loyalty from their customers who felt like they were part of an incredible Community however while sales seemed to be going well neither Ben or Jerry had any real business experience they soon came to the worrying realization they were barely making any profit one day they just closed the store and put a sign
on the window that read we're closed today so we can figure out if we're making any money they realized that their biggest problem was that they were over scooping basically giving out much bigger scoops of ice cream than they should Ben felt the best way to deal with the over scooping issue was to go wholesale up until this point they'd just been serving their ice cream in their store but they now decided to start filling up tubs with pints of their ice cream instead initially they tried to deliver these by car in the local area
but it meant if they got stuck in traffic they'd melt so they approached the bank for an even bigger loan so they could rent out an old factory and produce pints of ice cream to be sold in stores and local restaurants this was a big hit but it also meant they had just made a powerful Enemy by 1983 Ben and Jerry's sales had doubled from the previous year reaching over 1.8 million but that same year Pillsbury bought hundas another brand of premium ice cream that was sold in tub whilst hundas was a much more well-known
brand than Ben and& Jerry's at this point Pillsbury didn't like seeing this new ice cream rising in popularity and threatening their sales so in 1984 Pillsbury issued an ultimatum to the Distributors they had to choose between Ben and jerries or hundas they couldn't stock both since hundas was the much bigger brand with a market share of 70% the decision was easy and Distributors were soon calling Ben and& Jerry's to say they couldn't sell their ice cream anymore whil this tactic was completely monopolistic and unfair Ben and Jerry simply didn't have enough time or money to
take on a giant corporation like Pillsbury this was truly a David vers Goliath situation and without any Distributors it could be the end of Ben and Jerry's alt together but then Ben had an idea instead of taking this to a legal Court what about the court of public opinion their strategy was a big marketing campaign to paint Pillsbury as the evil Corporation stomping on the little guy they came up with the slogan what's the Doughboy afraid of in reference to pillsbury's mascot they positioned it as a big Corporation trying to restrict customers from having a
choice of which ice cream to buy and using their remaining funds they took out an ad in Rolling Stone and plastered posters everywhere to get the word out they even set up a hotline at which customers could call for details about what was happening and they were then encouraged to contact Pillsbury to voice their complaints the backlash against Pillsbury was immense and eventually the public pressure forced them to back down Distributors started working with Ben and Jerry's again and this whole stunt was a massive boost for them as it brought in a host of new
customers who decided to back David over Goliath with sales Rising Ben and Jerry seem to have made it to the big time but what should have been the entrepreneurial dream was actually Ben and Jerry's Nightmare before we get to the next chapter I have a question for you as after hearing about other entrepreneurs building their businesses have you ever thought about starting your own if so you're going to want to know about today sponsor bsy bzy offers a free LLC formation service you just pay the state fees and they'll help you get your business Incorporated
and handle all the necessary paperwork bzy can not only help with choosing the right entity type but can also help take care of the ongoing filing requirements with your state which can be a big burden on business owners bzy can even provide you with a business phone number and a professional business address with mail forwarding so you don't have to use your home address basically byy gives entrepreneurs the tools they need to start and manage vital aspects of their business so they can focus on serving their customers I also like that byy is made for
entrepreneurs by entrepreneurs the guys behind byy bootstrapped it without any investors literally starting in a spare bedroom fast forward to today and they're still founder Leed with over 20 years of experience and have helped over 1 million entrepr ERS so if you want to start your own company buy makes it easier just use my link in the description to get started today Ben and Jerry had not set out to build a big business and the stress and pressure of it all was becoming too much neither of them had ever liked the corporate world and so
at one point they spoke with a broker about selling the company but then they heard something that changed their minds if there's something you don't like about business change it this was a pivotal moment that would shape the future of Ben and Jerry's they wondered could they do things differently and use their business as a Force for good and help make the changes they wanted to see in the world for example they introduced a policy where the highest earner in the company could only earn a maximum of five times the lowest paid employee they also
launched the Ben and& Jerry's Foundation where 7.5% of their annual pre-tax profits would be used to fund Community oriented projects however as sales skyrocketed there was a pressing need for a new Factory that would cost $25 million so in 1984 they decided to take the company public to raise more money but they did something very unusual they decided only residents of Vermont could buy the stock the idea was to let their local Community invest rather than just opening it up to any random investors and this way their most loyal long-standing customers would be part owners
of the business however nearly everyone who heard this idea said it was naive and impractical and that they wouldn't raise enough money this way it was a huge risk to take but Ben and Jerry were set on the idea and miraculously the decision to just sell shares to Vermont paid off not only did they raise the cash they needed they also generated a huge amount of Goodwill among the households of month 1% of which now owned shares in Ben and Jerry's and it was looking like a good investment sales Rose from 4 million in 1984
to 10 million in 1985 and while the day-to-day was being taken care of by the staff they'd hired Ben and Jerry launched their next big marketing campaign called The Cow mobile a modified mobile home that Ben and Jerry drove across the us giving away free ice creams the trip was exhausting for the pair who slept on mattresses on top of the freezer but it it was great publicity seeing the founders hand out free ice cream across the country and it generated lots more Goodwill in fact in 1988 Ben and Jerry were given the US small
business persons of the Year award from Ronald Reagan that same year company revenues reached 32 million however there were problems looming it still seemed that no matter how much they worked they couldn't keep up with orders their Factory workers were doing 12-hour shifts to try and keep up with the growth but every part of their company's operations were straining under the pressure and inefficiency costs were spiraling out of control while Ben and Jerry were undoubtedly the heart of the company it was clear they needed leadership with more experience and so they decided to hire a
new CEO Ben and Jerry stepped further back from the day-to-day running of the company and instead focused more on the company's social Endeavors and at first this seemed perfect Ben and Jerry worked on things like ethically sourcing their ingredients and creating support for social causes they felt strongly about but then over the next few years ice cream sales started to fall and their stock dropped almost 50% from its peak sensing blood in the water the shark started circling several bigger companies wanted to buy Ben and Jerry's hey Legends it's John here creator of magnates media
just wanted to quickly share some exciting news with you so for those who don't know magnet media is not some big company I literally started this channel by myself from my bedroom making terrible videos I couldn't even afford a tripod so I had a camera on some books which is why the angle was a bit slanted so I couldn't have imagined I'd be where I am now because now I get to make videos about whatever topics I find interesting and I can do it from anywhere in the world as I don't have to be on
camera anymore and I have a small team to help me which means we can get super creative with the videos like experimenting with 3D and crazy animations it's like running your own mini Film Studio where you can make whatever you want however the problem is it took me years to figure all this out like how the algorithm Works how to hire the right people how to get big sponsors and make more money all this stuff that creators never publicly talk about so that's why I spent months and months putting everything I've learned into a simple
system that anyone else can follow for example if you wanted to run your own channel about True Crime history Tech Finance Sports whatever it is you're interested in you can just follow the system I've created I literally show you everything you need to make a full-time income from YouTube and all the behind the-scenes secrets of how I make the videos and how I grew the channel from zero to over 1.6 million subscribers and when you sign up you'll also get access to a community of other creators like we already have successful channels who've gone through
the program who you can connect with plus I'm in the community myself answering questions so you can literally ask me anything you want so you never feel stuck honestly this is the system I wish I had had when I started out as it would have saved me years of expensive and timec consuming mistakes so if you've ever wanted to grow your own YouTube channel this system is perfect for you just click the link in the description below to claim one of the remaining spaces or go to magnet. medsystem and I'll chat with you inside the
community in just a minute in 2000 the board reluctantly agreed to sell the company to the highest biders univa the sale sparked a dramatic public backlash Ben and Jerry were accused of selling out to a massive conglomerate and cashing in on the corporate machine they claimed to hate but in truth the founders didn't have much say in the matter Ben and Jerry's was a public company and youa L was offering so much money 326 million to be exact that the boorder of director directors felt they had no choice but to accept shortly after the sale
Ben underwent an emergency quintuple bypass to prevent a heart attack this was partly due to the stress of the acquisition but the biggest contributor was his years of ice cream consumption Ben believed you couldn't judge an ice cream without consuming the whole tub and so over the years of testing so many different new flavors he'd consumed vast amounts of ice cream thankfully Ben survived his surgery but he was still very anxious about the unil a deal however the Ben and Jerry team managed to convince unever that Ben and Jerry's was only worth so much due
to its commitment to social justice and that they'd be devaluing their new asset if they gave up on that mission they also put strict terms in the deal like it was agreed Ben and Jerry would maintain an independent board committed to upholding the values of the original company and so despite a few stumbles along the way the company has carried on releasing flavors that promote fair trade climate action diversity and other social issues for example they release flavors like hubby hubby in support of gay marriage now an ice cream company taking public stances on social
and political issues and even bringing out politically themed flavors of ice cream has unsurprisingly caused some back Clash at times but no matter what your political views what's interesting about Ben and& Jerry's compared to many companies is that the founders have been speaking up on issues they genuinely believe in unlike many companies that claim to be supporting causes but it's very clearly a calculated marketing stunt either way given their humble beginnings there's no doubt that Ben and Jerry's is an incredible business success story although it's not as incredible as Walmart if you want to know
how this Farm Boy built the world's largest company just click here to watch that next I'll see you there cheers
