Ice Cream Social

TEN

The Sale Agreements

Richard Goldstein’s office was on the twenty-first floor of Lever House, the landmark mid-twentieth-century skyscraper in midtown Manhattan where Unilever executives ran their North American operations. The first time Ben and Jerry met him there, “They had to walk down a corridor to get to our conference room,” he said. “And they took their time, chatting with everybody. They stopped at each desk and gave all the secretaries coupons for free ice cream.

“They were dressed in T-shirts and jeans, just like they dressed in Vermont. To them, nothing had changed—they just happened to be in New York. The staff never forgot them, though, and Ben and Jerry did the same thing every time they showed up. But then the meetings would ...