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Star Spangled Ice Cream

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Star Spangled Ice Cream
Founded2003; 22 years ago (2003)
Founders
  • Richard Lessner
  • Frank Cannon
  • Andrew Stein
Defunct2009 (2009)
Headquarters
Baltimore

Star Spangled Ice Cream was an American ice cream company founded in 2003 by three conservative activists and marketed as a politically conservative alternative to Ben & Jerry's, which the founders considered to be too liberal.

History

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In 2003, amid the beginning of the Iraq War, Andrew Stein and his friends decided to create an ice cream brand in support of George W. Bush. They agreed that Ben & Jerry's made good ice cream, but disagreed with the company's liberal politics, so they founded Star Spangled Ice Cream. The founders, Richard Lessner, Frank Cannon, and Andrew Stein, had no knowledge of how to make ice cream,[1] so they contracted production to a company in Baltimore called Moxley's.[2] The company sold ice cream online, and the price of dry ice to keep the product cold put the price at $66 for six pints or $76 for four quarts.[1] The company described the price of $76 as "patriotic", and ten percent of profits went to organizations supporting the United States armed forces,[3] including the Navy League of the United States.[4][5]

Star Spangled Ice Cream was based in Baltimore, Maryland.[6] The company, like Ben & Jerry's, made use of puns in their ice cream flavor names. Examples included "Fightin' Marine Tough Cookies & Cream", "Iraqi Road", "Smaller GovernMint", "G.I. Love Chocolate", "Navy Battle Chip", "Nutty Environmentalist", and "I Hate the French Vanilla".[1] "I Hate the French Vanilla" was later renamed to "Air Force Plane Vanilla".[7]

Star Spangled Ice Cream gave out samples at the 2004 Conservative Political Action Conference.[8] In 2005, the company began to sell its product in 7-Eleven stores in the mid-Atlantic United States.[9] That same year it began to be sold in stores on some American military bases.[10] The producer of the ice cream, Moxley's, struggled to keep up with the expansion of the business into physical locations.[11] The company was defunct by 2009.[12]

Reception

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Reviewers at NBC News described the ice cream as "tooth-achingly sweet", and noted that the base ice cream was good but had a chalky texture.[1] Taste testers assembled by The New York Times described the taste as "undistinguished", and one compared it to "the little cups of ice cream in elementary school, the kind with wooden paddles." The taste of "Smaller GovernMint" was compared to toothpaste and Noxzema shaving cream.[3] The Forward criticized some of the names given to the flavors, including "Iraqi Road" and "I Hate the French Vanilla", as overtly xenophobic.[13]

Musician Ted Nugent endorsed the brand and said that he enjoyed the "Gun Nut" flavor.[14] The company's founders said that Ben & Jerry's viewed them with contempt, although Ben & Jerry's never actually acknowledged the existence of Star Spangled Ice Cream.[1][12]

See also

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References

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  1. ^ a b c d e Johnson, M. Alex (February 10, 2006). "Take that, Ben and Jerry". NBC News. Archived from the original on January 29, 2025. Retrieved January 28, 2025.
  2. ^ "'I Hate the French Vanilla,' other flavors available in Baltimore Co". Maryland Daily Record. April 4, 2003. Archived from the original on June 25, 2025. Retrieved June 25, 2025.
  3. ^ a b Zernike, Kate (April 16, 2003). "With Liberty and Ice Cream for All". The New York Times. p. F4. ISSN 1553-8095. OCLC 1645522. Archived from the original on March 14, 2021. Retrieved January 28, 2025.
  4. ^ "Star Spangled IC Donates to Navy Group". Dairy Foods. June 1, 2005. Archived from the original on October 11, 2024. Retrieved June 25, 2025.
  5. ^ "Star Spangled Ice Cream, the conservative alternative to Ben Jerry's will donate $1,000 to the Navy League of the United States during the annual TalkFest radio talk show convention May 20, 2005 at the Ted Constant Center on the campus of Old Dominion University, Norfolk, VA". Ice Cream Reporter. Vol. 18, no. 7. 2005. p. 8. ISSN 0897-3261 – via University of Tampa Macdonald–Kelce Library.
  6. ^ "Sarcastically Patriotic Ice Cream". Dairy Foods. September 1, 2003. Archived from the original on June 25, 2025. Retrieved June 25, 2025.
  7. ^ Elghossain, Anthony (May 17, 2022). "Rebranding Foods for Political Consumption: a Long Tradition". New Lines Magazine. Archived from the original on May 21, 2025. Retrieved June 25, 2025.
  8. ^ Goldberg, Michelle (January 28, 2004). "The conservatives are outraged - about Bush". Salon.com. Archived from the original on June 20, 2025. Retrieved June 25, 2025.
  9. ^ "Star Spangled Ice Cream". Convenience Store News. June 13, 2005. Archived from the original on December 7, 2024. Retrieved June 25, 2025.
  10. ^ "Star Spangled Ice Cream, which bills itself as "the patriotic, pro-military conservative alternative to left-wing peacenik Ben Jerry's," is now for sale in stores on selected U.S. Navy, Marine, Army and Air Force bases". Ice Cream Reporter. Vol. 19, no. 1. 2005. p. 7. ISSN 0897-3261 – via University of Tampa Macdonald–Kelce Library.
  11. ^ "Too much of a good thing?". Maryland Daily Record. March 29, 2004. Archived from the original on June 25, 2025. Retrieved June 25, 2025.
  12. ^ a b Moscovitch, Philip (September 27, 2024). "Discontinued foods: Gone and should have been forgotten". Halifax Examiner. Archived from the original on September 28, 2024. Retrieved June 25, 2025.
  13. ^ Connelly, Irene Katz (July 22, 2021). "Ice cream wars: Ben & Jerry's is hardly the first to make frozen desserts political". The Forward. Archived from the original on June 28, 2024. Retrieved June 25, 2025.
  14. ^ "TED NUGENT Endorses 'Gun Nut' Ice Cream". Blabbermouth.net. October 7, 2003. Archived from the original on February 17, 2025. Retrieved June 24, 2025.
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