Ben & Jerry’s Factory Tour, Waterbury, Vermont
Alright, let’s all fess up. Barring the health-obsessed, lactose intolerant, or otherwise non ice-cream eaters (WHY?) among you, we have all greedily slurped down a pint of Ben & Jerry’s ice cream. Nowadays, you can buy Ben & Jerry’s everywhere, but way back in 1978, there was just Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield scooping out ice cream in a renovated gas station in Burlington, Vermont. Since I had my first taste of their signature Cookie Dough ice cream, I’d been wanting to go on the Ben & Jerry’s factory tour to see where the magic started.
The original factory in Waterbury, Vermont still churns out product, but a large part of it is devoted to memorializing the Ben & Jerry’s story. The walls are adorned with memorabilia from the early years- ice cream scoops, recipes scrawled out on napkins, old pictures, etc. Parked outside the tour entrance is a replica of the Ben & Jerry’s Cowmobile, which in 1986 drove cross-country handing out free samples. Walking around the factory, I felt like I’d stepped straight into the cartoon world of Ben & Jerry’s packaging.
Getting Tickets
The tickets are $4/adult and free for kids. The tours run all day long so you don’t need to worry about booking in advance. You just march up to the desk in the lobby, get your ticket, and start the tour at your appointed time slot.
The tour
The tour is about half an hour long and includes three phases. First, you’ll be ushered in to watch a video outlining the company’s history, all the way from when Ben met Jerry in the “back of the pack” at gym class to where Ben & Jerry stands today, a global Unilever brand.
Second, comes the actual tour of the factory, where one gets to see the machines that make the good stuff. The guide walked us through the production process, from the flash pasteurization of the local Vermont milk, to the flavoring, to the mixing in of the topping chunks, to the packaging. We weren’t allowed to take pictures of this phase (for fear of corporate espionage, apparently), so I’ll paint you a mental picture. Remember how Willy Wonka’s factory had those glass tubes circulating chocolate around the factory? The Ben & Jerry’s factory has silver tubes, criss-crossing all over the place, sending ingredients along their merry way. In some lights a simple assembly line, in others a brilliant culinary scientist’s laboratory.
Last, but best, we shuffled off to the Flavor Lab to wolf down our ice cream sample. Apparently, Ben and Jerry invented some of the brand’s signature flavors in that very room. When we were there, an ice cream wizard was buzzing about making the day’s sample flavor: a scrumptious chai spice creation.
After the tour, we headed back to the lobby to peruse the gift shop and grab more ice cream. My favorite flavor is Stephen Colbert’s Americone Dream, vanilla ice cream with a caramel swirl and fudge-covered waffle cone bits. It might just be my imagination, but the Americone Dream I had there tasted even better than the stuff chilling in my freezer.
Flavor Graveyard
Before leaving the factory, there was one more stop we had to make. Nestled on a hill behind the factory is the Flavor Graveyard, where the out-of-production Ben & Jerry flavors are remembered.
Wandering around and reading all the tombstones, I was impressed by the creativity of some of the flavors. Some were topically named, and many paired flavors I would have never thought to combined. I couldn’t help but wish that the Ben & Jerry’s factory tour included a tasting of some of these “dead” flavors.
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