We ran through quite a few samples last night and I have to say my son’s order of dark chocolate fudge brownie on a chocolate chip cookie was my favorite of the night - the ice cream was super creamy (they do it with high egg yolk percentage). Being on my feet and working gives me that instant gratification.” It’s not like buying a cool pair of jeans. (Present storefront excluded, he said his favorite is the East Village, which is made largely with black walnut paneling and cozy.) “The best part of the ice cream business is it’s all in the moment.
“For me the most joyful part is being around people and serving people,” Ben said. Softee on his way to a job interview in finance after college.)
(The idea started with him too - he drove a Good Humor truck as a senior at Greenwich High School in 2002 and came up with the idea for selling gourmet ice cream from a truck after spotting a Mr. The openings are not *quite* as exciting as it was initially (the first one opened in Greenpoint in 2010), he said, but being there to see people enjoy their ice cream holds the same power. They’ve had two rounds of private equity to expand both the wholesale business (the ice cream is made in Greenpoint) and the retail business the three are still majority owners.īut scooping is still where it’s at for Ben, who spends a lot of time in the shops still. They still run it, but now, with 31 shops and counting (19 in the city), it is a much bigger financial operation than those first days driving a decommissioned postal truck painted yellow around the city. The company was founded by Ben, his brother, Pete, and his ex-wife, O’Neill. But it was - three months later they had their first account, Whole Foods Tribeca (and I still remember getting my first taste from the brothers themselves in the aisles and have the hole-y t-shirt to prove it). “He asked, ‘Would you like to sell your ice cream at Whole Foods?’ and I thought, it can’t be that easy,” Ben said last night. He was scooping away when a rep from Whole Foods came for a cone. It was 2008, and Ben Van Leeuwen (in the photo above with a young friend) had brought the newly minted Van Leeuwen Ice Cream truck to Tribeca for the Manhattan Youth street fair next to the ballfields - it was their first day of business. Probably.I’ve often noted that so many local chains have incubated in Tribeca, but did not realize till last night that Van Leeuwen can sort-of be counted among them. If something is made good and makes you feel good then that something is good for you. We know the importance of physical health, but equally important is mental health. And it’s why we’re always willing to go the extra mile. Good means being good to our customers, our partners, and to each other.
We want to create the best ice cream for all. We don’t just want to be the best ice cream there is. This is true whether it’s classic ice cream. That’s why we are obsessed with exactly what goes into our ice cream and what stays out. If you can’t pronounce it you probably can’t digest it. We kept going then and we keep going now innovating, creating, never settling. It’s probably no coincidence that we started out as a scoop truck in NYC, because we didn’t stay put. BECAUSE A LIFE WITHOUT ANYTHING GOOD IS BAD. TO MAKE GOOD ICE CREAM THAT MAKES YOU FEEL GOOD.
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