Ben & Jerry’s's Co-creator Jerry Greenfield Resigns, Citing Parent Company Silenced Social Mission
Ben & Jerry’s's co-creator Jerry Greenfield has stepped away from the iconic brand after almost five decades, as stated by a message from his business partner Ben Cohen.
Cohen’s post shared what he described as a letter from Greenfield, in which the exiting co-founder called it one of the “toughest and difficult decisions” of his career.
Greenfield asserted that the organization had been silenced by Unilever and that its independence to speak out on global issues was now “lost.”
“Unless the business was willing to advocate for the things we cared about, then it wasn’t worth being a company at all,” he wrote.
This move came even after a acquisition deal meant to protect the brand’s social mission, Greenfield added.
“This autonomy existed largely because of the unique acquisition terms” that he and Cohen had arranged with the conglomerate, Greenfield wrote.
The ice cream maker and its parent firm did not immediately respond to a media inquiry from Reuters.
Recently, Cohen revealed that amid disagreements with the parent company, the firm had tried to engineer a sale to buyers at a reasonable price of $1.5bn–$2.5bn, but the offer was rejected.
Unilever and the ice cream brand have been at odds since at least recent years, when the ice-cream maker announced it would halt sales in the contested West Bank. Ben & Jerry’s has also taken legal action against its corporate parent over alleged attempts to restrain it and has referred to the conflict in Gaza “genocide.”
