There’s a flavor called Cherry Garcia.
Named after Jerry Garcia. Lead guitarist of the Grateful Dead. A man who dropped acid, improvised 20-minute guitar solos, and built a following that didn’t care what mainstream America thought of him.
That’s who Ben & Jerry’s named an ice cream after.
This wasn’t edgy marketing. This wasn’t a brand trying to seem cool. This was two guys from Vermont saying: we are those people. The Grateful Dead people. The ones who don’t follow templates. The ones who jam until something true comes out.
That flavor told you everything about the brand before you even tasted it.
For forty years, that identity held. Ben & Jerry’s made flavors with Stephen Colbert and Jimmy Fallon. They pulled sales from Israeli settlements in the West Bank. They called out Trump by name. They made a flavor called Pecan Resist. They were annoying if you disagreed with them and thrilling if you didn’t. That was the point. The brand had a position.
