This required them to travel to the factory for each production run to help grind ingredients like nutmeg and cinnamon. Starting the business with only $60,000 forced the founders to do "almost everything."īecause they didn't have the funds to build their own ice cream making facility, they had to outsource their production to a small factory in upstate New York. They also set aside funds to hire an artist to design the aesthetic that would come to define Van Leeuwen's brand.īut even though it had a slick look, Van Leeuwen was very much a ramshackle operation when it launched in 2008. Still, it was enough to buy a pair of used Post Office trucks off of eBay and give them a second life as retrofitted ice cream trucks. An introduction to ice creamĭespite their best efforts, they were only able to raise a total of $60,000 from 15 friends and family members. Here's how Van Leeuwen went from a lone ice cream truck in SoHo to a multimillion-dollar business capable of bringing in upwards of $300,000 a day from its scoop shops alone. Van Leeuwen has nearly 50 scoop shops in seven states across the country, and its pints are sold at nearly 10,000 grocery stores including Walmart and Whole Foods. "It was so fun."ĭays like that are few and far between for Ben, who since founding Van Leeuwen in 2008 has grown it into a nationwide brand. "I ended up scooping till midnight because it was so busy," he says. "The plan was to drop off all of this ice cream and drive straight back to New York, because the next day is Monday and I have to work," he says.īut he arrived to find 100 people already waiting in line and decided to help hand out ice cream for an hour to alleviate the crush. Which is how the 39-year-old found himself pulling up to the Van Leeuwen factory in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, eight hours later to load a refrigerated truck full of hundreds of tubs of his famous ice cream before making the five hour drive to D.C. on a Saturday night and nobody can deliver that ice cream," Ben tells CNBC Make It. You may have to select a menu option or click a button.Ben, who as CEO had long since left the responsibilities of making deliveries behind, was surprised to find himself on a text chain about the new store.
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