Sweet Choices Essay -- Business, Dairy Queen, Grandpa McCullough

I. The Beginnings of Dairy Queen The founders of Dairy Queen's famous soft serve ice cream, John Fremont 'Grandpa' McCullough and his son Alex McCullough, originally established the Homemade Ice Cream Company in 1927 in Davenport, Iowa. The father and son duo originally sold an assortment of ice cream products in and around places like Moline and Rock Island, Illinois, and Bettendorf and Davenport, Iowa, until the need to expand in the early 1930's caused the McCullough's to decide to relocate their ice cream mix plant to a former cheese factory in Green River, Illinois. The process the McCullough's used to make ice cream was difficult and complex: Butterfat, milk solids, sweetener, and stabilizer were first combined, then mixed, and finally put into a batch freezer where the combination was chilled, given a specific amount of air (technically called 'overrun'), and flavored. The product was denser and richer than most ice creams, with less overrun. When the temperature reached 23 degrees Fahrenheit, a spigot was opened in the freezer and the soft ice cream flowed into three- gallon containers. The containers were covered with lids, frozen at minus-ten degrees Fahrenheit, and delivered to customers. When an ice cream store was ready to serve the product, the ice cream was put into a dipping cabinet and the temperature increased to five degrees Fahrenheit. (IDQ 1920-40) At the time, ice cream was frozen solid to accommodate manufacturers and store owners when they transferred the ice cream from one location to another location. However, when ice cream is served at such cold temperatures, it causes consumers taste buds to become numb which, subsequently, meant that consumers could not get the full flavor of the ice... ...65 in Canada, 123 in Japan, and over 30 in eight other foreign countries. (IDQ 1970) While the addition of the Peanut Butter Parfait and the Hot Fudge Brownie Delight in the 1980's proved to be very successful, it was the Blizzard that propelled the company to the number one spot in America's treat chain industry. This unique soft serve medley, mixed with fruit, cookies, and candy, sold over 175 million units in its first year alone. (IDQ 1980-90) The company gradually continued domestic and international growth in the early 1990's. Around the U.S., stores began to open in more non-traditional areas such as airports, railroad stations, shopping malls, and even office complexes. Internationally, the company planned to open stores in Western and Eastern Europe while development was started in Thailand, Cyprus, Kuwait, Oman, Taiwan, and Indonesia. (IDQ 1980-90)