B E N   &   J E R R Y ' S
I C E   C R E A M   F A C T O R Y

Waterbury, Vermont

Wooo Hoooo! In 1991 Ben & Jerry reached 58 million dollars in sales. By then they had more than 68 scoop shops in 19 states. Hmmm. More than 68 scoop shops? That sounds a bit strange. Didn't they know -exactly- how many scoop shops they had in 1991? If they couldn't accurately count the number of stores they had, I cringed to think just how far off their other accounting numbers may have been. Maybe it was really only 5.8 million dollars in sales for 1991?

Actually that's probably what would have happened if Ben & Jerry did the accounting themselves. There was a time, early on in the business, when things were tight and they were scrounging around for money. Within a large stack of papers on a desk one of them discovered an old, uncashed check. Needless to say both were elated. But their joy was quickly squashed when they discovered 3 bills within the same paper pile that had gone unpaid and when added up exceeded the newly found uncashed check.

Also in 1991, their Westbury, VT Ice Cream Factory was named Vermont's most popular tourist attraction. They entertained 210,510 guests that year. VIDEO: Look at all the happy tourists (0.99 MB), albeit somewhat broken. 1991 was also the year of great flavor introductions. They introduced the famous flavor "Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough" which quickly became their number one best seller. I know it's my favorite VIDEO: Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough is Number One! (0.98 MB)

This same year Ben & Jerry received an honorary Doctors of Law from the University of Vermont. VIDEO: Hats off (0.88 MB) to Ben & Jerry!

In 1991 was this One World, One Heart Festival. Ben & Jerry are very charitable folks so I'm sure it was somehow related to that mindset.

The last significant happening in 1991 (Wow, 1991 was a big year for Ben & Jerry's) was they instituted a policy of paying struggling farmers extra for their milk. VIDEO: It was a time of sad farmers and sad cows. (1.24 MB)