- [Narrator] Today, the global ice cream market
is worth $79 billion.
- There are things like marshmallow ice cream,
birthday cake ice cream.
I've had truffle ice cream.
Whether it's soft serve or hard scoop,
ice cream awakens our taste buds.
- [Narrator] But it wouldn't be what it is
without a few visionaries
who were trapped in the world of mundane ice cream.
- In the '70s, we had the vanillas,
the strawberries, the chocolates.
There wasn't a lot of ice cream creativity.
- [Narrator] Until one unsung innovator
dreamed of something more.
- And he goes, "You know what?
There can be better ice cream out there, and I can make it."
- Mix in whatever you want.
Oreos, M&M's, Heath Bars.
- This mix-in technique allowed the customer
to create their own flavor of ice cream.
- It was an experience that just blew people's minds
and became very popular, very fast.
- [Narrator] Inspiring unlikely business partners...
- I just want something I can taste with my eyes closed.
- [Narrator] To stumble into a billion dollar business.
- Ben & Jerry's is the bar for any kind of mix-in ice cream.
- [Narrator] They'll take ice cream to new heights.
- I don't think that they realized that this taste
was going to change the ice cream business forever.
- [Narrator] And invent unheard of combinations.
- Cookie dough, man, that's proof God loves us
and wants us to be happy.
- [Narrator] Fueling industry titans to respond.
- Dairy Queen was a franchise all over the country.
They were able to reach a much larger audience
with their mix-ins.
- [Narrator] And spurring the creation
of an iconic American frozen treat.
- Now you have this ice cream mix-in
readily available to consume
by every drive-thru customer in America.
- [Narrator] Ice cream will never be the same.
- This ain't your grandma's ice cream.
(intense music)
(tense music)
- [Narrator] At the start of the 1970s,
America's farms face a crisis.
Leaf blight kills over 15% of the nation's corn crops.
- Farmers lost about a billion dollars worth of corn crops
in one growing season.
It's about six or $7 billion in today's money.
And there's a ripple effect.
Dairy farmers need corn to feed their cattle.
- [Narrator] As feeding livestock
becomes more expensive,
industries dependent on these animals
inevitably increase the prices of their products.
- A gallon of milk is 20% more than it was.
So if milk is more expensive,
then every product that's manufactured that uses milk
is more expensive.
Yogurt, cheese, butter, and of course, ice cream.
- [Narrator] As a way to keep costs down,
many ice cream brands of the day
get creative with their recipes.
- The big producers of ice cream
were whipping in more air to their ice cream.
When you whip air into ice cream, you stretch it out.
You get so much more out of your ingredients,
but the richness is completely absent.
- They were cutting back on the cream in ice cream.
So as a result,
you're getting the most basic ice cream possible.
- So even after the cost of milk stabilizes,
ice cream manufacturers
really aren't altering their recipes.
It's sort of like the way the airlines charge for check bags
to offset the rising cost of jet fuel.
Even when jet fuel comes down in cost,
they're not gonna eat into their bottom line.
They can get more and still give you less.
- All the joy of ice cream is about that mouthfeel
and that texture.
And back in the '70s, that's not what you got.
It was kind of a dearth of delicious ice cream.
So people who were into the idea of great flavor,
were like, "Why can't we do better with ice cream?"
(pensive music)
- [Narrator] In Boston,
one ice cream fanatic is just trying to make ends meet
by working as a cab driver.
- During the Vietnam War, he was a conscientious objector.
He was a pacifist.
He actually became an English teacher for a couple of years,
and then he decided to drive taxi cabs,
and he is living with his friend.
He isn't totally sure what he wants to do with his life.
- [Narrator] His name is Steve Herrell
and the current state of ice cream is inspiring him
to take matters into his own hands.
- As a child, Steve Herrell's family would make ice cream
with one of those old-fashioned crank machines.
- They would make delicious ice cream at home
and make sundaes,
and enjoy them with all these wonderful toppings.
And he figures ice cream could be a whole lot better.
- [Narrator] Herrell's frustration will one day
lead to the creation of countless ice cream flavors
and a business worth more than $79 billion.
But in 1973, Herrell just wants a superior quality ice cream
for his cherished sundaes.
- This wasn't some entrepreneur.
Steve's just a working class guy
who wanted to make better ice cream,
but he's willing to go to great lengths
to prove that he can do a better job
than anyone else at the time.
- So he had one of those old-fashioned, small batch,
electric ice cream freezers.
- He finds the right gear reduction
that slows down that churning process dramatically.
The slower that you turn, the less air that's incorporated.
You're gonna get a denser, creamier product.
- It can mimic the slow churning process that happens
when one makes ice cream by hand.
It's rich, it's cold, it's creamy.
- [Narrator] To test his creation,
Herrell wants to recreate his childhood favorite:
a hot fudge sundae.
- [Roommate] Here you go.
- [Narrator] And he recruits his roommates
to find him the ideal chocolate for homemade fudge.
- A Heath Bar?
Wait, no, I can't use this.
I need a bar of solid chocolate.
Sorry, guys. Can you go back?
- Yep, sure thing. - Thanks.
- [Narrator] Created by two brothers in 1928
in a small town in Illinois,
Heath is a candy bar made of toffee, almonds,
and milk chocolate.
- Heath Bars were a business created by the Heath family.
And this was a very obscure candy at the time,
and what's actually pretty funny is that
the Heath brothers were actually running an ice cream parlor
before they decided to invent this candy bar.
(crunching)
- [Herrell] Mm.
- [Narrator] Yet Herrell can see that
the chocolate treat has untapped potential,
and experiments with a Heath Bar topping for his sundae.
- So the Heath Bar is toffee,
which is kind of like a hard, sugar/butter mix,
it's like an amber sort of color, coated in chocolate,
and you'd crunch your way through a Heath Bar
and it would create this very caramely, treacly kinda texture.
And he realizes, wait a minute.
This crunch, this sort of, I don't know, treacly,
almost bitterness that comes with toffee
works really well with the cold, creamy sweetness of ice cream.
It's the perfect contrast.
- [Narrator] An inspired Herrell then takes it one step further,
mixing the Heath Bar topping right into the ice cream.
- You get the soft lick of the ice cream,
and then you've got this hard crunch.
And Steve just saw this innovation and said, "Why not?"
You don't put stuff on top of the ice cream.
You put it in the ice cream.
I mean, bam! Yeah.
- [Narrator] Steve Herrell has stumbled upon
a totally new way to create distinctive ice cream flavors.
- Back then, what we had were the basic flavors.
The vanillas, the strawberries, the chocolates,
and there wasn't a lot of ice cream creativity.
- Steve realizes, "Not only is my ice cream better,
but I can mix in all these ingredients
and come up with myriad numbers of combinations
that people cannot get anywhere else."
- M&M's, Reese's, cookies, brownies.
Any sweet imaginable can now become
an ice cream flavor of its own.
- [Narrator] Inspired by his unique ice cream,
Herrell sees more than just a simple hobby,
believing it's a creation he needs to share with the world.
- Steve comes up with what, in retrospect,
is an absolutely genius idea, right?
An ice cream parlor where the customers mix in
various types of candy bars into his ice cream.
- [Narrator] A business centered around
mixing sweet treats into homemade ice cream
will be more transformative than Herrell could ever imagine.
But first, he'll have to figure out where to start.
- Steve Herrell didn't exactly have deep pockets,
yet he decides it's a good idea to quit his job
and get into the ice cream business
with zero food business experience.
- [Narrator] As Herrell wonders
how to make his risky dream a reality,
215 miles north of Boston,
two lifelong friends are preparing
to open a food business of their own.
- Cohen and Greenfield grew up together in New York.
They went to school together
and they were the two slowest kids in their gym class.
Cohen was more of the free spirit, the creative type.
While Greenfield is more of a rule follower.
- It's within our budget.
That's about all this place is.
- Ah, come on, man.
Use your imagination.
- So these two Jewish New Yorkers, hippies,
want to go into the food business,
and they decide that they're gonna go to
the New England town of Burlington, Vermont.
- [Narrator] These two partners will go on to create
one of the most iconic ice cream businesses of all time,
selling over $900 million a year
and reinventing ice cream in the process.
- The name they chose, it couldn't have been simpler.
- Jerry & Ben's.
- Well, why is your name first?
I mean, mine begins with a B.
- That's a fair point.
Ben & Jerry's.
- [Narrator] But for now,
they have something different in mind.
- And what did they decide to do?
- Ben and Jerry decide that
they're gonna sell one of their favorite foods.
- Best bagels in the country.
- A bagel shop.
- It's gonna be great!
- [Narrator] In 1977,
childhood friends Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield
are acquiring equipment for their new business,
a bagel shop.
- Hey, how about this one?
- Ben and Jerry want to open a bagel business in Vermont,
but they have no idea how to start one,
and they have no idea how expensive it is to start one.
- [Jerry] We can't pay that.
- And plus, there's no guarantee that
the people of Vermont will even want bagels
in the first place.
- Ben and Jerry were able to scrape together some funds.
They each contributed $4,000.
And as anyone who has opened their own business knows,
that isn't a whole lot.
- What's the cheapest equipment you got?
- So apparently, it costs a lot of money to make bagels.
The equipment costs thousands of dollars,
and Ben and Jerry just don't have it.
- [Salesman] What about this?
- They decided, "What can we make with the money we've got?"
They can make ice cream.
- So they decide to pivot.
And thank God for all of us ice cream lovers of the world
that they did.
- [Narrator] With every penny they own on the line,
Ben and Jerry take the leap into opening an ice cream shop,
even though they've never made ice cream before.
Back in Boston, after months preparing to launch,
it's opening day at 29-year-old
Steve Herrell's unique ice cream shop.
- Steve's Ice Cream is located near several colleges.
Right in the front window of his shop,
Steve puts his re-engineered ice cream machine.
It makes five gallons at a time,
which is roughly 160 scoops.
- [Narrator] The ice cream flavor options are vanilla,
chocolate, strawberry, and coffee.
- The quality of ice cream there was very, very high-end.
Nice, really rich, dense ice cream.
- I mix in whatever you want.
Oreos, M&M's, Heath Bars, Kit Kats.
- What was a novelty about it is that
he offered brand candy that had been chopped up.
- Different candies needed to be broken up
to different sizes in different ways
in order to be properly incorporated into his ice cream.
And a cold piece of marble was the best surface
and the best means of integrating
all of these wonderful candies into the ice cream.
This was decades before Cold Stone Creamery
ever used that kind of technology.
- [Narrator] The myriad of combinations
leave customers overwhelmed.
- It's kind of a lot to take in.
I imagine it would be like
walking into Willy Wonka's chocolate Factory.
You're just kind of in awe
and you're excited about the possibilities.
- [Narrator] Some don't even recognize all of the options.
- He's throwing these candy bars
into his ice cream mix-in,
which really allows people to try some of these candy bars
for the first time.
- [Narrator] Battling to quickly serve customers,
Herrell gets creative,
inventing his own mix-in recommendations.
And one is emerging as a clear favorite.
- One cookies and cream.
- Steve Herrell was the first one to have the idea
to mix Oreo cookies into a vanilla ice cream base.
And then he gave it the name Cookies and Cream.
- Who doesn't love an Oreo with milk?
We did it when we were kids.
Steve just found that flavor memory,
reached right into our consciousness, and said,
"I'm gonna turn that into an ice cream."
- Today, that's one of the most popular ice cream flavors.
Not many people know that that originated
in Steve's Ice Cream Shop in the 1970s.
- [Narrator] Herrell's homemade mix-in ice cream
quickly outshines other Boston offerings,
sparking a booming business.
Yet he's hard-pressed to keep up with orders.
- Steve's Ice Cream is really making the news.
People all around are starting to hear about it.
- He sells out his first 32 gallons of ice cream
that he made in his first weekend.
- He actually ended up having to close the shop for a week
to hire more staff, train them,
and prepare for the ridiculous demand
that was coming from the locals.
- [Narrator] As he struggles to keep up
with his newfound success,
Herrell has no idea he's pioneering a revolution
that he won't get credit for.
(tense music)
By 1977 in Burlington, Vermont,
Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield are testing out
their first batches of ice cream.
- When they decided to pivot to ice cream,
the only real training they had between them
was the correspondence course at Penn State
on making ice cream.
They had no formal culinary education outside of that.
- [Narrator] And a lifelong health disorder is intensifying
their quest for the perfect ice cream.
- Ben had this rare sinus condition called anosmia,
which basically means that
the signals don't get quite transmitted right to the brain
regarding smell, which affects your sense of taste too.
- Ben Cohen,
not really having the ability to taste very well,
relies on a lot of different textures to taste his food.
- Ben and Jerry were developing ice cream flavors
when one half of their partnership
couldn't really taste what they were making.
- I just want something I can taste with my eyes closed.
- Okay, then.
- [Narrator] With all their attempts falling short,
the partners are in need of help.
- Who has the best ice cream in New England?
(tense music)
- Ben and Jerry actually got inspiration
for their million dollar business
from this small little shop in Boston.
And can you guess who that was?
- How can I help you?
(tense music)
- [Narrator] Visiting Steve Herrell's
Boston ice cream shop in 1978,
business partners, Ben and Jerry,
experience a radically new way to make ice cream.
- It's nothing top secret, I'll tell you how it works.
- Steve's just a guy who wanted to share
his love of rich, creamy ice cream with the world.
He didn't wanna keep it from anybody.
And what Ben and Jerry realize is that
people aren't just coming in for this really creamy,
well-made ice cream, it's the mix-ins they love.
- Steve's Ice Cream was where Ben and Jerry
first were exposed to the idea of mix-ins
and adding these processed ingredients like candy
into ice cream.
- So they took the idea from him, basically.
I mean, that's how things happen in this world.
- These guys love food and they're like mad scientists.
They're throwing in everything you can think of.
Coconut, caramel, chocolate.
It's unreal.
- [Narrator] Ben and Jerry discover
a fusion of mix-in flavors that perfectly capture
the textures they've been searching for.
- Ben, with his anosmia,
with his inability to properly gauge flavor,
tastes the ice cream and the crunch,
the flavors explode in his mouth, and instantly,
both he and Jerry know this is the jackpot.
- [Narrator] But when they apply for a loan,
the bank won't back their business plan.
- I mean, he's right.
Who's gonna buy ice cream in the winter?
- Vermont is one of the coldest states in America.
It's not a big ice cream haven
except maybe for a month or two in the summer.
Otherwise, you're gonna be broke the rest of the year.
- Let's just try something else.
- They knew they wanted to sell ice cream,
but because it was Burlington,
they were a little wary of selling ice cream
year round in New England
where people might not be craving ice cream
in the middle of winter.
- Aha!
Vegetable stew.
Okay, traditional, old-fashioned, Welsh rarebit.
(laughing) No.
- So they supplemented the menu with some savory items.
There was soup, they also sold crepes.
- [Narrator] The new, non-seasonal menu items
help secure the loan, bringing them one step closer to opening.
(tense music)
In Boston, Steve Herrell is facing
an opposite set of challenges.
- His ice cream dreams are reality.
He started this whole ice cream craze
that was so successful it had to grow,
and it ended up burning him out.
- [Narrator] After achieving his goal
and pioneering a whole new ice cream trend,
Steve Herrell makes a life-changing decision.
- So after just a handful of years,
Steve Herrell sold off the company for $80,000.
That was a steal for the buyer.
- He ostensibly kind of fled from Boston.
He wanted to live on the land in Western Massachusetts.
- Steve's Ice Cream would never be the same
without Steve, without the founder.
And though Steve sold his shop,
he really was the magic behind the mix-ins.
(tense music)
- [Narrator] Nine months after Herrell sells his business,
on May 5th, 1978,
Ben & Jerry's Homemade officially opens its doors.
- When you go to Ben and Jerry's first shop in Burlington,
they had a picture of Steve in the shop,
in homage to this guy.
- Welcome, first time?
- [Narrator] Unfazed by the immediate success
that overwhelmed Herrell,
they make a significant shift
in their ice cream's preparation.
- So instead of doing their mix-ins on the spot,
they realized it wasn't very efficient
and they could add their mix-ins in advance
to each batch of ice cream and then sell it as a flavor.
- They had flavors like Oreo mint, maple walnut,
flavors that were pretty exotic.
- Let me tell you,
that was a damned good ice cream experience.
This was not some ground up little bits.
These were chunks, right?
And it was like, oh my God.
- [Narrator] But with winter on the horizon,
their ice cream sales begin to dwindle.
- People really love the ice cream.
They weren't as interested in the soup or the crepes.
- 15.
- [Narrator] With few customers showing up,
Ben and Jerry won't be able to keep the business open
much longer.
- They had to start thinking of different ways
to get their product to people
who maybe weren't willing to go outside in the winter
and come to their ice cream shop.
- Uh, do you have a top for this?
- I'm sorry, no.
- They're seeing more and more customers
who wanna get their ice cream to go, so they realize,
"Look, we don't have to keep waiting for people
to come to us.
Why don't we take the ice cream to the people?"
(dramatic music)
- [Narrator] This idea not only has the potential
to turn the business around.
If they're successful,
it could change how people consume ice cream.
(tense music)
- [Narrator] It's been six months
since Ben and Jerry launched their ice cream shop
featuring unique mix-in flavors.
And as winter sets in,
Ben and Jerry are rethinking their entire business.
- Ben and Jerry thought that
maybe their customers want the ice cream on their own terms.
Well, the solution to that is distribution in grocery stores.
- [Narrator] But they don't know the first thing about
packaging ice cream for home enjoyment.
- So around this time,
the norm for ice cream containers like Breyers
were these sort of rectangular tubs
with the rounded corners.
- [Narrator] While most ice cream containers at the time
are half gallon tubs,
the large size presents a problem for the duo.
- If you have that giant tub sitting on your kitchen counter
and you're scooping out a couple bowls,
what's gonna happen is it's gonna start to melt.
- Melted ice cream is bad enough,
but when you have all those mix-ins,
they sink to the bottom.
It wasn't the ice cream experience
they wanted for their consumers.
- [Narrator] They seek something different
from the industry standard,
a cylindrical pint.
- What the pint offers is three key benefits.
It melts slower, it's easier to pack and ship,
and it is less susceptible to freezer burn.
- [Narrator] In 1980, Ben & Jerry's unique flavors
are for sale in Burlington grocery stores.
Their initial launch features eight flavors
including mocha walnut, chocolate fudge, and Oreo mint.
- They were priced at $1.79 each, which is really expensive,
almost $7 today.
So to build up customer trust,
they offered a money back guarantee
to anyone who was unsatisfied.
- Ben and Jerry made the brilliant decision
to sell their flavors in smaller pints.
And let's be honest,
usually the pint is in and of itself a serving vessel.
And sadly, very often, a serving size.
- The pint really rebranded ice cream
as something of a personal indulgence.
- Hi, I'm Ben. - I'm Jerry.
- [Narrator] As Ben and Jerry introduce themselves
as the face of their business,
the pints become an instant hit.
In only a couple of months,
their grocery store accounts grow to 35.
- And they start asking themselves,
"Look, if this can work in Vermont,
maybe it can work elsewhere."
So they start looking into
the wholesale side of the business
and pushing into more grocery stores in neighboring states.
- [Narrator] As more people become familiar with
Ben & Jerry's unique ice cream,
they expand to 200 grocery stores,
selling nearly 80,000 pints by the end of 1980.
But the move to become the first
national distributor of mix-in ice cream
comes with major changes.
- Ice cream is one of the most perishable,
easily damageable foods in the marketplace.
Pivoting to national retail ice cream sales
is extremely risky
and moreover, it's extremely expensive.
- [Narrator] To attract new customers across the country,
Ben and Jerry come up with a unique way
to brand their ice cream:
with creative names.
- They wanted to stand out in the supermarket,
and they had some suggestions
from their ice cream obsessed fan base.
- "Make an ice cream with cherries,
you can call it Cherry Garcia."
(laughing)
- They realize having fun, punny naming is just gonna work,
so they just run with it.
- Chubby Hubby, and Chunky Monkey, and Cherry Garcia,
I mean, all these flavors started coming out.
For a product that everyone associates with childhood,
that was unprecedented.
They really took it to the next level.
- [Narrator] By 1982,
their sales are approaching $1 million.
Yet with success comes greater competition
as major food companies want in
on the next generation of ice cream.
- Ben & Jerry's affected other brands as well,
encouraging them to get more creative with their flavors,
add more exciting ingredients.
- [Narrator] In June of 1983, food giant Pillsbury snatches up
a family owned ice cream company called Haagen-Dazs.
- Pillsbury sees that
the premium grocery store ice cream world is about to boom.
So they start promoting the Haagen-Dazs brand
and they're gonna put it right up against Ben & Jerry's
in every grocery store in America.
This puts Ben & Jerry's in direct competition
with a multinational company and their large wallet.
- Haagen-Dazs was known for
their extremely smooth ice cream,
but Ben & Jerry's is taking off with their chunky stuff.
So Haagen-Dazs introduces
their own mix-in flavors, called "Exträas."
- [Narrator] The competition will soon move
beyond the freezer section
as one innovator makes a bold move
at a popular ice cream chain.
His name is Sam Temperato
and he's a top franchisee of Dairy Queen.
- He owned something like
67 Dairy Queen franchises in just the St. Louis area
in the 1980s,
and he really had his finger on
the pulse of ice cream trends at this time
and was always looking for inspiration
that he could adapt for Dairy Queen.
- [Narrator] By 1983,
Dairy Queen dominates the soft serve market
with about 42% of all sales.
But as more and more customers
are turning to ice cream with mix-ins,
their business has stalled.
- Dairy Queen was founded in the 1940s
and it served a whole menu of fast food,
but their ice cream was really distinct.
They had soft serve cones, vanilla, chocolate, or a twist.
- But the '80s had come and so much had changed in food.
Dairy Queen had flat sales across the country.
They weren't the place to go anymore
and Dairy Queen is looking around for something
that will bring consumers back.
- So Sam sees the success of Ben & Jerry's,
and he says to himself,
"Why can't I do the same with soft serve?"
(pensive music)
- [Narrator] But Temperato comes to realize
it's not as easy as it sounds.
- Soft serve is served at about 20 degrees warmer
than a standard ice cream.
And the problem is when you start introducing mix-ins,
it increases the melt rate.
- When you're mixing ingredients into ice cream,
that ice cream base needs to be sturdy
and firm enough to hold those ingredients.
That's why you're not gonna see a lot of mix-ins
with something like soft serve.
- [Narrator] Temperato is convinced
there must be a way to make mix-ins work with soft serve.
If he doesn't figure it out,
he knows it's just a matter of time
before someone else does.
- [Narrator] By the early 1980s,
ice cream has become a $1.6 billion industry,
with Ben & Jerry's becoming
the fastest growing ice cream company in the country.
- They're opening franchised ice cream shops
throughout the Northeast.
And their pints are in 35 states in America.
- In just four years,
Ben and Jerry have gone from trying to open a bagel shop
to be a national distributor of ice cream,
and they're on their way to becoming millionaires.
(tense music)
- [Narrator] Their success is causing much larger corporations
to take notice,
like Dairy Queen franchisee, Sam Temperato,
who's been trying to come up with
a soft serve based mix-in product for months.
- Dairy Queen's soft serve, it's light and airy,
it's great for ice cream cones,
it's great for creaminess, but it's not so good for mix-ins.
- [Narrator] After weeks of experimenting,
Temperato gets inspiration
from a neighborhood custard stand.
(machine whirring)
- In St. Louis on historical Route 66
is a place called Ted Drewes Frozen Custard.
Before any of the mix-in craze began,
Ted Drewes would create something called The Concrete.
- It looks like a milkshake served in a cup,
but it's eaten with a spoon.
- It is so thick that it was, and is still to this day,
served through the window upside down,
- [Narrator] Intrigued, Temperato contemplates
the possibilities of mixing Dairy Queen's soft serve
in a blender, mimicking the process of creating Concretes.
- Sam Temperato's surprised by the results.
When you put the soft serve into the blender,
it actually starts to thicken it
almost like the way you thicken whipping cream.
So the soft serves takes on a thicker texture
and is able to hold the mix-ins better.
- [Narrator] Temperato's creation is like nothing
customers can get at the grocery store.
- It wasn't the same thing that Steve
or Ben and Jerry was doing,
'cause he wasn't just adding candy to ice cream.
By taking these two ideas, mix-ins and soft serve,
and blending them together,
he was able to create a whole new type of frozen treat.
- [Narrator] His creation will eventually become
the most celebrated frozen treats in the world,
growing the company's annual sales to over $5.5 billion,
across 7,000 locations worldwide.
- Sam has this great idea.
He brings it to Harris Cooper, the CEO of Dairy Queen.
- Ben & Jerry's are selling like crazy.
Grocery stores can't stock them fast enough.
- Okay, what does that have to do with Dairy Queen?
(tense music)
Hmm.
- [Narrator] Despite the creation being well received,
it's going to require substantial investment.
- A milkshake machine isn't really designed
to just plow its way through solid candy.
- I can't mix this with a regular mixer.
We need to create one from scratch
and then put one in every store.
- [Narrator] CEO Harris Cooper
approves the development of a custom blender
for each of their over 4,000 locations.
- So they developed a special machine
that would go down and pulverize the product
and make everything together, mixing it as a unit.
- Introducing new equipment
to every Dairy Queen franchise location in America
is a huge, huge investment.
This is a big risk, right?
They don't know if it's gonna be a success
or a complete flop.
- [Narrator] In 1985,
Dairy Queen's answer to the mix-in craze
is launched from coast to coast.
- It's a little bit crazy, it's a little bit wild,
and he appropriately names it the Blizzard.
- Now you have this concept of the ice cream mix-in
that has been transformed
and made to consume by every drive-thru customer in America.
- [Narrator] In a strategic move,
they don't just use name brand candy,
they officially partner with the brands themselves.
- Because Dairy Queen is such a big and trusted brand,
other brands like Oreos, Heath Bars,
M&M's are more willing to work with them
to get the free advertisement from being in their Blizzards.
- And that spells trouble for Ben & Jerry's.
(tense music)
- [Narrator] Back in Vermont...
- You can read this one.
- [Narrator] Ben and Jerry are finding out
that they don't have the same pull
as a national powerhouse like DQ.
- It's not fan mail.
- Nabisco?
- Dairy Queen has been selling their Oreo Blizzards
because they have a direct relationship with Nabisco,
the maker of the Oreo.
While Ben and Jerry has been selling their Oreo mint flavor
without Nabisco's permission.
And now that Ben & Jerry's is becoming
a more successful company, Nabisco says,
"That is not how this cookie is gonna crumble."
- [Narrator] But with Oreo Mint
being one of their most popular flavors,
its loss would signify a huge blow to the company
unless they can come up with a replacement.
- So Ben and Jerry are experimenting around
with their own cookie recipes.
And during this process,
they have a game changing breakthrough.
- [Narrator] Ben and Jerry are on the verge
of unwittingly creating
one of the most popular ice cream flavors in history.
- [Narrator] No longer permitted to use the name Oreo,
Ben and Jerry opt to lose Oreos entirely from their recipe.
- All right. - We'll try it.
- [Narrator] And create their own unique
cookie flavored ice cream.
- Ben and Jerry decided to combine ice cream
with the batter that you would eat off of the mixer.
- They actually developed a very complicated process
for isolating chunks and making sure they didn't freeze solid,
and still maintained their chewy consistency.
- It's not just creamy, it's not just crunchy.
It has that sort of sandy granularity of the sugar,
so it gives you another texture to play with.
- [Narrator] They give their ice cream masterpiece
a straightforward name.
- It's called Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough
'cause it's cookie dough!
It's the real deal.
And to me, that so embodies what Ben & Jerry's is all about.
- That is very, very smart
and very, very evil all at once.
- And it speaks to the fun, snacking,
naughty kid in all of us.
I mean, yeah, making chocolate chip cookies is fun.
But eating cookie dough?
Man, that's proof God loves us and wants us to be happy.
- They created an iconic ice cream flavor
that is now one of the great ice cream flavors.
- [Narrator] As Ben and Jerry
continue pioneering ice cream mix-ins...
(tense music)
Meanwhile, Dairy Queen's newly released Blizzard,
which sells for only $1.29, becomes an instant sensation.
- There you go.
- Customers love seeing their favorite name brand candies
that they could mix in,
like Butterfinger, and Oreos, and Heath.
And of course, M&M's, always M&M's.
- They were used to this very light and creamy soft serve,
but the Blizzard is a heavier, denser product
filled with these chunks of candy and cookies.
- [Narrator] Temperato's innovation
turns Dairy Queen's business around.
- Have a nice day.
- It is so popular that within the first year,
175 million Blizzards are sold in the United States.
How is this possible?
It is a testimony to how widespread Dairy Queen is
all over the country.
- Dairy Queen was hardly the first shop
to mix in candies and cookies into their ice cream.
We saw Steve Herrell do it.
We saw Ben and Jerry do it.
But Dairy Queen was the biggest chain to do it,
and this really put mix-ins on the map.
- [Narrator] It's a treat that pushes Dairy Queen
to become a multi-billion dollar company
and spurs a whole raft of copycats.
- The Blizzard sets off a whole new craze
with similarly, meteorologically cold names
from the Carvel Carvalanche, Friendly's Cyclone,
the McDonald's McFlurry,
and the Baskin Robbins 31 Below.
Its mix-ins blended in, in a brand new way.
- [Narrator] In the 1990s, Ben & Jerry's flavor innovations
propel their sales to a whopping $97 million,
a tenfold jump in just six years,
cementing their status as a household name across the US.
- Ben & Jerry's impact on the ice cream industry at large
was huge.
People now, when they go to the grocery store,
instead of just picking up a plain tub of ice cream,
they're looking for fun flavors.
- There's very much the vibe of,
"This ain't your grandma's ice cream."
Can get a peanut butter filled pretzel, a chunk of banana,
a piece of ice cream cone, little chocolate fish.
And flavors like Half Baked and Phish Food
and Wavy Gravy, Americone Dream.
- By 2000, Ben & Jerry's is so successful
that they sell to Unilever,
a massive multinational corporation,
to the tune of $326 million.
- Today, Ben & Jerry's is distributed to 38 countries
in up to 75 available flavors.
They have over 600 scoop shops worldwide,
and they churn out 400 pints of ice cream
every single minute.
- No one's reached their heights.
I mean, it's Ben & Jerry's and they're still, to me,
in terms of a premium mix-in ice cream, the bar,
the bar to reach.
- [Narrator] Although Samuel Temperato passed away in 2006,
his contributions left an indelible mark,
affirming his status as the King of Dairy Queen.
- Sam took this idea that had originated in New England,
and he introduced it to ice cream lovers
on a much larger scale.
And today, everyone is familiar with
these ice creams with mix-ins in them.
- [Narrator] Today, Dairy Queen
has annual revenue of $3.6 billion,
but it was a little known cabbie
who laid the foundation for the ice cream revolution.
- Steve Herrell doesn't have as much name recognition
as, let's say, Ben & Jerry,
but he's arguably just as influential
in the world of ice cream.
If you've ever eaten ice cream with a Heath Bar mixed in,
or cookies and cream, then you've tasted his legacy.
- Without Steve, there would be no Ben & Jerry's
and flavors like Half Baked and Phish Food,
and there might not be something like the Blizzard.
While Steve Herrell doesn't have
the vast financial success of Dairy Queen or Ben & Jerry's,
he follows his heart to live a much simpler way of life.
But after a few years, he feels the ice cream itch
and he opens another ice cream shop.
- [Narrator] Steve's second shop,
Herrell's in Northampton, Massachusetts,
continues to serve mix-ins to this day.
- And it's not unusual to pop in and see
what many call the godfather of 20th century ice cream,
standing right there, saying, "One scoop or two?"