What you might not know is that her name is Woody , and they settled on a cow because cream — and area dairy farmers — were an integral part of their business. Woody as we know and love her almost wasn't, though. The final design for Woody was the work of artist Woody Jackson. Ben had seen the Vermont native's cow-centric work floating around in various forms, and wanted to commission him to design their official cow.
The number he had for the artist was for his ex-girlfriend, though, so when he called and left a message there was a very real chance he would never get it. She passed along the message, though, and within the year they had not only drawn up the artwork, but a contract that took Woody the cow's image nationwide.
Their misstep wasn't so much dark as it was hilarious , and when they decided to name a vanilla-and-rum malt-ball-filled ice cream "Schweddy Balls" after a Saturday Night Live sketch, they were protested by the Mississippi-based One Million Moms. In , they were targeted for being racially insensitive, releasing "Taste the Lin-Sanity" in honor of Harvard basketball star Jeremy Lin. The vanilla frozen yogurt, which was filled with lychee and honey swirls — along with pieces of fortune cookie — was decried as being a racist jab at the Taiwanese-American sports star.
There's been a flavor made for everything you can think of — with the notable exception of grape. Urban legends have grown up around the absence of a grape-flavored ice cream, including one that says Ben made one once, but it was eaten by a dog. The dog tragically died, and Ben swore he would never make it again. Since grapes are mostly water, freezing them and turning them into ice cream on a large scale means you're going to end up with ice chunks in your ice cream — and no one wants that. There's also a certain amount of suspicion about grape ice cream, making them certain that not enough people would want it to make the resources needed to develop it a worthwhile investment.
So, there you have it — no dogs were harmed. Along with that went a promise that started in the earliest days of the company, and that was the idea that the wage discrepancy between the highest and lowest paid workers would be no more than 5 to 1. That's a huge deal, and it stayed that way for 16 years.
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The problem came when Ben retired, and no one wanted to step into his shoes making the money that he had been making — the salary that the 5 to 1 ratio demanded. That ratio was gradually raised, and over the next six or so years it jumped to 17 to 1. Once they were sold to Unilever USA, corporate went rather hush-hush about their paying practices. Ben and Jerry built a brand not only on amazing ice cream, but on Fair Trade products, supporting growth hormone-free dairy farmers in Vermont, environmentally friendly packaging and practices, and giving around 7.
Their company structure remains at least semi-independent from Unilever, with most of their decisions — including wages — being set by a board of directors. According to the Veterinary Centers of America , having a pet-friendly office is one of the biggest benefits employers can offer to help care for the emotional well-being of their employees: Not only are employees welcome to bring their dogs with them to work, but they call their canine employees their K-9 to 5'ers , keep plenty of treats on hand, and have their profiles up on their corporate website.
I do, and I think they have lived in exile since in an environment that looks with nostalgia on everything that happened in that conflict.
And it says something deep about who Ted Cruz is when he talks about where he came from, because he was raised in that environment. Whether his father was fighting Castro hand to hand in the jungles or not, what matters in many cases is the iconography and the choice to embrace these stories. Inevitably some will worry that acknowledging that storytelling exists somehow distorts or overshadows the literal facts of a situation.
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A better path is to let both forms exist — storytelling to provide myth, and journalism to document and record. Our collective hunger to do that says more about our culture and how much it enjoys shaming than it illuminates about our subjects. This week I was in Nashville, and a storyteller there over dinner finished a great story, cocked his head and said, without irony: Topics US elections Opinion. In practice, courts are deferential to board decision making.
Under a doctrine called the business judgment rule, unless the directors have a conflict of interest, nearly all board business decisions are beyond judicial review. If there is a potential benefit to shareholders, the courts will not interfere. Its founders, lawyers, and lobbyists had taken many steps to prevent a hostile takeover. To cancel a poison pill, an acquirer must either find a friendly board or get one elected.
The company had two classes of common stock, one with 10 votes per share and the other with one vote, and between them they held three-quarters of the super-voting stock. The New York Times Co. Faced with an entrenched unfriendly board, a would-be acquirer might have gone to court claiming that corporate law required the board to redeem a poison pill.
This was unlikely for two reasons. First, although Vermont courts have not been presented with this situation, most state courts that have considered it have rejected any such obligation.
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Second, even if the obligation might theoretically exist, this situation was unlikely to trigger it. Suppose, however, that a Vermont court had required the board to act to redeem its poison pill or enter into a merger agreement.
It does not mean the offer will succeed. If a majority of shareholders do not agree to tender their shares for sale, the attempted takeover fails. If they did not tender, they retained their stock and their control of the company.
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The foundation itself could not be taken over because its board members selected their own successors. There is one complication in the analysis above. The board would, after all, owe fiduciary duties to the holders of super-voting stock, and a duty of good faith and fair dealing to holders of the preferred stock. Corporate law permitted super-voting stock and the granting of a veto to a charitable foundation. Moreover, corporate law allows directors to reject an offer, at least where the directors have not irrevocably committed themselves to a sale.
Some cynically claim that the founders were ready to cash out.
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People close to the decision say they were motivated by fear of litigation, followed by a judgment that they would have to satisfy personally. Financial success is also essential to staying is control. Most important, the chief safeguard for maintaining the social mission is the people in control.
A hybrid legal form is neither necessary nor sufficient to maintain a social enterprise Although the publicly traded corporate form can be challenging, many businesses employing it have pursued social missions with vigor and endurance.