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The Good Scoop

卸売りのアイスクリーム事業を成長させる方法に注力した経緯
月商 $16,000 · 創業者2人 · 従業員1人 · Sacramento, California, USA
Stephen Layton(Founder, The Good Scoop)· 創業 February 2016 · 記事掲載 — · thegoodscoopicecream.com · 元の記事

何の商売か
誰がカリフォルニア州ディクソン周辺に位置するレストラン、食料品店、小型マーケット、コーヒーショップなどの法人顧客、および一般の消費者(COVID-19パンデミックで外出できない・したくない人)。高品質なオーガニック・手作りのアイスクリームを安定して提供したい法人、または自宅で手軽に楽しみたい個人
何のためにパンデミック下でも顧客の需要に応え、事業を維持・成長させたい法人顧客。また、厳しい状況でも日々の小さな楽しみとして、美味しいアイスクリームで気分を明るくしたい個人。既存の卸売先を維持しつつ、新たな販路を開拓して事業を拡大したい
何を買うか手作りのスモールバッチ(少量生産)オーガニックアイスクリーム。定番フレーバーに加え、季節限定フレーバーも提供。価格はパンデミックの影響で一時的に値下げ中だが、具体的な売値は確認できず。実店舗(Dixon)での小売販売と、法人向けの卸売り、フードデリバリーサービスを通じて販売

創業当初は実店舗での小売が中心だったが、COVID-19パンデミックの影響で卸売事業に注力し始めた。個人向けにはフードデリバリーサービスも活用。集客はFacebook広告、Google広告、Yelp、Facebook、InstagramなどのSNS、そして口コミで行っている(推測)。月商16,000ドル(約240万円)、従業員1人(創業者は2人)は不明な時点での自己申告(ユーザー提供情報に基づく)。

売値の出典: 売値は確認できず(2026-10-14 取得)

You have to be willing to try new things and new ideas.

使っている道具

会計: QuickBooks
広告: Facebook Ads, Google Adwords
分析: Google Analytics
その他: Google Drive, Google Drive
決済: Square, Apple Pay
業務: G Suite, Google Workspace
reviews: Yelp
SNS: Facebook, Instagram

Hello again! Remind us who you are and what business you started.

Hello again, my name is Stephen Layton and I'm one of the owners of The Good Scoop located in Dixon California. We make our own ice cream by hand in small batches using fresh ingredients. We take great pride in making the best ice cream possible and like to have fun while bringing a smile to people's faces. The Good Scoop has some standard flavors but we also make flavors that change with the seasons. Some of her best-sellers are cookies and cream, chocolate, and our version of Cookie Monster. We use natural blue coloring to achieve blue flavor for a Cookie Monster ice cream along with house-made edible cookie dough and all-natural chocolate cream cookies. This has been a challenging year for all businesses including ours. Our sales have been all over the board, when COVID first hit it was initially a huge drop then we got busy for a short bit, then once again we were slow only to get busy again. it's truly been a wild ride this year. I know that we are not alone and that nearly all businesses are having to adapt and deal with a highly unusual year. Want to start an ice cream product? Learn more ➜

Tell us about what you’ve been up to! Has the business been growing?

Businesses have been facing lots of challenges but with challenges always come opportunities. Pre-COVID we had plans to expand with a shop in Sacramento, unfortunately, the potential opening of that coincided with many of the lockdowns in California thus, we were not able to complete the project. It was a very tough decision and one that we did not take lightly. The business has still not returned to normal in many of the urban cores with Sacramento included in that group. Although a tough decision, we still believe it was the right decision to opt-out of that project. We have refocused our energy on our shop in Dixon as well as growing our wholesale business. We lost a few wholesale accounts with all the lockdowns but have since added a few new ones and have some new exciting business partnerships on the horizon. You have to be willing to try new things and new ideas. Our staffing levels have remained pretty much constant over the past year. We have had some staff changes but that's inevitable with a small food-based business, most notably we've had some changes with our ice cream makers. The person who was making ice cream for the past year left under good terms but it was time for him to move on. We trained up another younger gentleman who we really enjoyed working with but after a few short months he too moved on for some other opportunities. After going through all those changes, my business partner Steve decided to take over making the ice cream. He is doubled and making the ice cream before and loves to cook. Since he's taking over any challenges we had with production have gone away and Steve has been making some really delicious ice cream flavors. This is definitely the slower time of the year for an ice cream shop so we are kind of hunkered down for the winter at the moment but we're looking forward to a great spring and summer with Steve making some new and exciting flavors. We know that this is a challenging time for all people and businesses in this country, we included, so in response to that, we have reduced some of our prices temporarily this fall to help our business and to help support the community that we love. We know that many people are doing without and/or on tight budgets. We really do believe that a scoop of ice cream can brighten up a person's day and bring a smile to someone's face. We just wanted to make sure that we kept their product accessible to people. We've also done some specials throughout the summer with some discounts and other offers. This past year we have embraced the food delivery services that are very prevalent in our world. These have helped us out moderately but have helped to make a product more accessible to those who either were not able to come out or did not want to come out. It is not going to huge moneymaker for us but it has been a nice supplement. We've also tried some delivery options in adjoining towns and neighborhoods as well as converting an online ordering website to wholesale only to accommodate the growth and wholesale we are seeing currently

What have been your biggest lessons learned in the last year?

Some of the biggest lessons we've learned over the past year are to be patient and keep doing what we do best. For us, that is trying to make the best ice cream we can and having fun. I believe that when people are happy when they're making the product it really does translate into a better product. When COVID first hit we thought that was going to be it for our small business. We did not panic, we did have some very thoughtful and in-depth conversations. We reduced our hours and changed how our business operated by taking away some products, removing ice cream tasting, and implementing very stringent cleaning regimens. This showed us that one needs to be adaptable and resilient to the changing world that we live in. We hope that there is a return to normal shortly, we remain cautiously optimistic. I know they'll be another challenge right around the corner. We hope that making it through this pandemic will prepare us for the next challenge ahead.

What’s in the plans for the upcoming year, and the next 5 years?

We are really excited about expanding to some other venues in Dixon including other local businesses called the Dixon Fruit Market. We plan to both continue to grow our wholesale business and focus our energies there. We've been reaching out to lots of different businesses including restaurants, grocery stores, small markets, as well as coffee shops looking for partners. So if anyone knows anyone in the greater Sacramento area that would like to carry some delicious ice cream please don't hesitate to reach out to us. We're sending messages, making phone calls, and getting out there to see what we can do. Over the next five years, we would really like to grow our wholesale business and be distributing ice cream up and down the Sacramento Valley to several small local businesses.

Have you read any good books in the last year?

Although I love reading and do a lot of it every day, the majority of my reading is focused on children's books as I have two young boys at home between the ages of 2 and 5. This takes up quite a bit of my time and all of my reading is dedicated to reading children's books. I don't mind though, I love spending time with my kids and reading them books. They love books and so do I.

Advice for other entrepreneurs who might be struggling to grow their business?

The struggle is real. It is very difficult to grow your business, there's lots of competition and the challenges seem never-ending. Perseverance is important, never give up and keep trying. You have to be willing to try new things and new ideas. We continue to try new flavors, staffing levels, different hours we are open as well as other creative ideas. We reach out to other businesses and chat and see what they're doing. You can learn a lot from listening and observing.

Are you looking to hire for certain positions right now?

We are not looking to hire anyone at this moment, we just switched over to our winter hours with our shop closed on Monday and Tuesday. During these days that our shop is closed, we are focusing on filling wholesale orders and keeping your current staff employed. When the warmer weather comes around in the spring, which is early March here in California, we always hire a few new employees.

Where can we go to learn more?

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