One Organic Family Farm - Lick Honest Ice Creams

Interested in starting your own entrepreneurial journey in food and beverage but unsure what to expect? Then read up on our interview with Anthony Sobotik and Chad Palmatier, founders of Lick Honest Ice Creams, located in Texas, USA.

What's your business, and who are your customers?

Since 2011, Lick Honest Ice Creams has crafted artisanal ice creams with peak-season ingredients sourced responsibly from local farmers and food artisans. Co-Founders and partners Anthony Sobotik and Chad Palmatier are committed to sustainability, supporting the Texas community, and creating enlightening flavors. To Chad, Anthony, and the Lick team, "honest" means using the purest, most transparent ingredients available to craft artisanal ice creams. What doesn't go into the ice creams is just as important as what does. Lick Honest Ice Creams never uses artificial colors or flavors, high fructose corn syrup, or preservatives. The team can trace every single ingredient to its source. Ice cream shouldn't just taste good — it should also be good.

Tell us about yourself

We both grew up in rural communities enjoying homemade ice cream and came to appreciate the need for small-town ice cream shops that crafted seasonal flavors with locally sourced ingredients. As we closed our New York chapter to head to Anthony's native Texas, we realized the community needed this style of scoop shop. In 2011 we brought our dream to fruition, offering "honest ice creams" to savvy palates in Texas. We wanted to marry Pennsylvania's family farm and mom-and-pop ice cream shop culture with rich Texan flavors. By focusing on our individual strengths (Anthony spearheading ice cream flavor creation and Chad overseeing the branding, marketing, and shop aesthetics), we were able to create the Lick Honest Ice Creams many central Texans know and love today.

During the first nine months of operation, we did everything on our own. Anthony produced ice cream in 3-gallon batches in the back of Austin's original South Lamar shop while Chad and Anthony's sister, April, served honest scoops until they ran out.

During the summer of 2013, we began selling pints wholesale to local retailers and moved production to a kitchen in Northwest Austin. In August 2014, we opened our first San Antonio location at The Pearl and began shipping pints nationally in December 2015. We're fortunate to celebrate a decade in business this year!

What's your biggest accomplishment as a business owner?

Running our own ice cream business, dreaming up our ideal desserts and treats every day, and getting the chance to work hand in hand as both life and business partners have been extremely rewarding experiences. Our community constantly inspires us to be the best versions of ourselves as we strive to make the world a better place through ice cream and entrepreneurship. As we've grown, we've built a fantastic team around us, and it's exciting to see the passion and talent that they bring to the company. It's one of the best things about running this business, truly. While we know that challenges will always await us, we're extremely grateful for the numerous lessons we've learned along the way.

What's one of the hardest things that come with being a business owner?

Running a business, we face challenges every day. From the beginning, due to delays in construction, we missed summer ice cream season when we first opened, which certainly wasn't ideal. Pulling double duty (running the shop and churning out new flavors while Chad still worked his full-time corporate job) was a daunting experience at times. A decade later, we don't regret a single moment. There are hiccups constantly but building a strong team and persevering through those challenges together lends to an even greater sense of accomplishment that's shared by the entire team! Our biggest challenges currently are hiring enough staff and working around the uncertainties in the supply chain. Both of these challenges require that we be flexible daily, whether it's amending shop hours to accommodate staff or changing our pint packing to accommodate a late shipment of pints.

What are the top tips you'd give to anyone looking to start, run and grow a business today?

How much time do you have? Ha! Honestly, the main piece of advice we always give is that you need to love what you want to do with every bit of your being. It seems simple and perhaps obvious, but it really can't just be a hobby when you open your own business. You'll be living it every moment of every day, so your passion for your business and success needs to be able to fuel you through the long road ahead.

We are excited to continue to grow our brand and offer honest ice creams to enthusiastic and adventurous ice cream lovers in Texas. We will be opening up additional scoop shops across Texas in the coming year, including those in College Station and Houston. We are also working on expanding our reach outside of The Lone Star State by growing our CPG (Consumer Packaged Goods) reach. We currently have our ice cream pints and ice cream sandwiches in about 120 accounts in Texas, but we're aiming to expand that offering to include the west coast as well as the central region of the country by the end of this year.

Where can people find you and your business?

Website: https://www.ilikelick.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/lickhonesticecreams
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lickicecreams/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/lickicecreams

If you like what you've read here and have your own story as a solopreneur that you'd like to share, then email community@subkit.com; we'd love to feature your journey on these pages.

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