Ben & Jerry’s, as we know and love it, will never be the same following the news that Jerry Greenfield, who co-founded the iconic ice-cream brand alongside business partner Ben Cohen nearly 50 years ago, has resigned.
Cohen took to social media on Wednesday, revealing Greenfield’s decision to leave the company, accusing the brand’s parent company, Unilever, of stifling its ability to speak out on social and political issues, a practice that has been synonymous with the brand’s identity since its inception. With a number of lawsuits and publicly posted letters over the last years, the conflict between Greenfield, Cohen and Unilever has been well documented.
Now, just a few hours after announcing his resignation, Cohen has revealed to CNN that this conflict of interest has been “tearing him [Greenfield] apart”.
“Jerry has a really big heart… So he felt like he had no choice to resign,” Cohen said. “Jerry’s kind of sad that it’s come to this, but part of him is feeling a sense of relief that he’s no longer in this intense conflict.”
Unilever purchased Ben & Jerry’s in 2000 in a $326 million deal that allowed the company to operate independently, giving it the freedom to continue its social mission without interference. Cohen and Greenfield remained at the company but moved away from operational roles to focus on social missions.
Since the acquisition, Cohen said, the entire management team has turned over and none of the original team who signed the deal remains. Cohen said that the company has started to disrespect the terms of its arrangement, with tensions boiling over in recent years, when a decision for Ben & Jerry’s to pull its operations from Israel was overruled by Unilever.
In recent months, the duo have butted heads with the company over politically focused social media posts that Cohen said Unilever opposed and threatened to fire people over.
Ben & Jerry’s is currently in the process of being spun off from Unilever into a new company called The Magnum Ice Cream Company, which expects to be publicly traded in November.
In a statement, a spokesperson for The Magnum Ice Cream Company said: “We will be forever grateful to Jerry for his role in co-founding such an amazing ice cream company, turning his passion for delicious ice cream and addressing social causes into a remarkable success story. We thank him for his service and support over many decades and wish him well in his next chapter.
“We disagree with his perspective and have sought to engage both co-founders in a constructive conversation on how to strengthen Ben & Jerry’s powerful values-based position in the world.
We remain committed to Ben & Jerry’s unique three-part mission – product, economic and social – and remain focused on carrying forward the legacy of peace, love, and ice cream of this iconic, much-loved brand. Ben & Jerry’s is a proud and thriving part of The Magnum Ice Cream Company and we look forward to further building on its success”.
Cohen has decided to stay with the company in Greenfield’s absence to continue the fight for its independence. “I’m glad that we’re both standing up for the values of Ben and Jerry’s,” Cohen said. “I think that I can be most helpful from the inside and Jerry’s going try to be helpful from the outside.”
Cohen said he is committed to the brand’s independent board and will continue to convince the parent company to release the brand to a group of investors that is dedicated to Ben & Jerry’s social mission.
“When we came up with that three-part mission, we deliberately wrote it horizontally to make the statement that they are all equally as important,” he said. “As the company acts on its social values and as it produces great ice cream, it ends up making a good profit,” Cohen said.
“The reality is that businesses are incredibly political,” he said. “The average business, (are) using their money to influence elections, and they’re using their money and their lobbyists to influence legislation.
“The only difference is that Ben and Jerry’s political aspects are overt, where we let people know what we think, whereas other businesses are covert.”
Despite Greenfield’s departure, the duo’s friendship, which reaches back to their early teen years, remains as strong as ever. Cohen said that “the spirit of Jerry will always be at Ben & Jerry’s”.
“It’s been an amazing ride. It’s been an amazing adventure, an amazing odyssey. There’s been good times, there’s been bad times, there’s been challenging times, and we’ve been through them all together, Jerry and myself, and it’s just built a stronger bond between us.”
