From Pints to Joints: Ben & Jerry’s Co-Founder’s New Cannabis Company

Ben Cohen just launched a weed brand with a high-minded purpose—giving away 100% of its profits to right some of the racial injustices from America’s War on Drugs. Ice cream sold separately.
One summer night in 1970, years before Ben Cohen teamed up with Jerry Greenfield to launch one of America’s most successful ice cream companies, he was smoking a joint with some friends under a lifeguard tower at Jones Beach on Long Island, New York.

Cohen saw the lights of a police car driving towards them and told a friend to get rid of the roach. At that time, marijuana was just as illegal in New York as heroin. And a small doobie could land you in jail.

“‘Ronnie, eat the jay!’” Cohen, now 72, remembers telling his friend. “The cops get out and they’re searching around with their flashlight and sure enough Ronnie didn’t eat it—they found the jay and arrested us.”

At the stationhouse, the two recent high school graduates were strip searched, and things weren’t looking good for a couple of longhaired dopers. “Eventually, as we were white middle-class guys, we ended up getting tickets for littering a lighted cigarette butt on the beach,” says Cohen, in his home office just outside Burlington, Vermont.

The run-in could have changed the course of Cohen’s life—and those of chubby hubbies everywhere. Instead of going to jail, he went to college, dropped out, drove a taxi in New York City, tried his hand at pottery before starting Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream in 1978 with his childhood friend, Jerry, out of an abandoned gas station in Burlington. By 2000, after Ben & Jerry’s was acquired by Unilever for $326 million (around $580 million in current dollars), Cohen pocketed about $40 million, the equivalent of $70 million today.

But all these decades later, Cohen still can’t shake the feeling that if he had been Black, that night in 1970 would have ended very differently. He has good reason to believe that the color of his skin gave him a Get-Out-Of-Jail-Free Card: Black people are nearly four times as likely to get arrested for marijuana possession than white people, despite similar usage rates, according to a report by the ACLU.

Read the full story on Forbes: https://www.forbes.com/sites/willyakowicz/2023/05/05/ben–jerrys-cofounder-gets-fully-baked-with-new-nonprofit-cannabis-company/?sh=3fb8d2d04265
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50 Comments

  1. McKenna on September 29, 2023 at 7:49 am

    oh i wish i had money.



  2. benji k on September 29, 2023 at 7:50 am

    if you eat ben and Jerry’s and then take a hit from a joint it taste super bad



  3. Michael Meade on September 29, 2023 at 7:50 am

    F those guys



  4. michaelsiengo1 on September 29, 2023 at 7:51 am

    I know your tricks you just want me to get high any more Ben & Jerry’s, which I already do



  5. i walk in circles on September 29, 2023 at 7:52 am

    I see why they are trying to reschedule weed. To help the super rich avoid higher taxes



  6. LeadMunitions on September 29, 2023 at 7:53 am

    Well no more ben and Jerry’s for me..



  7. Bruce Watson on September 29, 2023 at 7:57 am

    Racist company do your research if you want to support that stuff.



  8. Noah Reyes on September 29, 2023 at 7:57 am

    Should have called it Half Baked



  9. izzyostos on September 29, 2023 at 7:57 am

    I used to have like an inside man and my 2 bestfriends would always bash me saying its fake ben and jerrys dont make wax and id just laugh it off



  10. Life is Not Grape on September 29, 2023 at 7:58 am

    this man needa stay outta da weed game



  11. Jeff on September 29, 2023 at 7:59 am

    Who would buy cannabis from a Woke Joke company like Brn and Jerry’s 😂



  12. jonathanlianpy on September 29, 2023 at 8:02 am

    420



  13. Nakkiteline on September 29, 2023 at 8:03 am

    his weed company shoud be named ben’s but not jerry’s



  14. tom w on September 29, 2023 at 8:03 am

    Ben out here supporting the gospel of mids and im here for it



  15. Number 6 on September 29, 2023 at 8:05 am

    Thats the dumbest back story ever 😂



  16. Jeff on September 29, 2023 at 8:07 am

    Woke bs



  17. Lyle Rosenthal on September 29, 2023 at 8:07 am

    Super dope but they buggin abt the low thc count fr



  18. Pine on September 29, 2023 at 8:08 am

    shouldve been "pints to pounds"



  19. Gerben Bakker on September 29, 2023 at 8:11 am

    Berney Sanders is now into weed?😂



  20. Sa’vaughn Martin on September 29, 2023 at 8:12 am

    Should’ve been “From pints to pounds” somebody hire me



  21. matthew pishalski on September 29, 2023 at 8:12 am

    That’s cap about the Turpines and low THC. He didn’t come up with that. 😂



  22. BrennanCL on September 29, 2023 at 8:12 am

    So big dog is just selling mid at a premium lmao



  23. Thomas Fyfield on September 29, 2023 at 8:12 am

    Don’t like his politics but this checks out for me.



  24. Shiftless Lazycrat on September 29, 2023 at 8:13 am

    If their joints are anything like their ice cream, I expect high prices, average quality and ridiculous combinations.



  25. Thomas Albert on September 29, 2023 at 8:14 am

    Ah, “it’s too strong”, the commercialization truest begins. Don’t forget, tobacco, when not processed like in cigarettes is a powerful psychoactive as well, and the dilution of effects, commercialization and mass production all go hand in hand.



  26. Chris 414 on September 29, 2023 at 8:16 am

    Texas is gonna legalize weed very soon



  27. Pistol Master Tequila on September 29, 2023 at 8:19 am

    I can confirm it does increase the ice cream sale



  28. YoungRoddie on September 29, 2023 at 8:21 am

    The second I heard it’s to strong now adays means b3 is gonna sell dirt old hippie weed



  29. Doss Malone on September 29, 2023 at 8:23 am

    I can tell you right now this brand is going to fail the fact that his main complaint was the strains nowadays are too strong😖😖😖 grow your own and don’t try to sell it you’ll be greatly disappointed it’s not about what you like it’s about what the customer likes and the customer likes the quality back in the prop 215 days in California if you can’t produce that quality the money’s going to go to someone who can🤗



  30. RobTrip on September 29, 2023 at 8:26 am

    Monopolies should be illegal. Dude has an empire already and now wants to take another skilled labored empire as his own without any sacrifice. 👎🏽



  31. The Cannabis Marketer (CannaGlobe) on September 29, 2023 at 8:26 am

    This is such a good inside look 😂



  32. omgmakeupbynova on September 29, 2023 at 8:30 am

    this is absolutely amazing



  33. YoungRoddie on September 29, 2023 at 8:33 am

    From pints to ounces



  34. D I Dauchan on September 29, 2023 at 8:33 am

    👀 I was devouring My favorite Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream while watching this 🙏🏾🔥🔥🔥



  35. Minh Tran on September 29, 2023 at 8:34 am

    Thats not fair. Im poor too and want a business loan but im asian soo no go??😅



  36. SamLy on September 29, 2023 at 8:36 am

    The only potential to compete with Cookies



  37. Kitsune on September 29, 2023 at 8:37 am

    Y’all weak 😂



  38. YoungBreezzy66 on September 29, 2023 at 8:37 am

    Ben invited to the cook out



  39. Motorious7 on September 29, 2023 at 8:38 am

    I wonder if this new business is also on stolen indian land.



  40. Contemplating 101 on September 29, 2023 at 8:38 am

    👏👏👏



  41. Dusty pants on September 29, 2023 at 8:38 am

    All that money spent just to grow some mids



  42. Al B on September 29, 2023 at 8:40 am

    How nobody called this from pints to ounces I do not know, they really dropped the ball



  43. Josh Brito on September 29, 2023 at 8:40 am

    30% thc is not enough for me



  44. bmxrider on September 29, 2023 at 8:40 am

    VT/NH has the worst weed laws.



  45. Devon Niles on September 29, 2023 at 8:41 am

    So weed fa ppl 30-50 in age. Great market 😂



  46. Bomboclaat on September 29, 2023 at 8:41 am

    kinda disappointing to hear its gonna be low grade weed hes making, but still cool to know ben is making a cannabis company tho🤣



  47. Kai Iversen on September 29, 2023 at 8:41 am

    Idk sounds kinda whack make ice cream medical



  48. Onlye Heart on September 29, 2023 at 8:43 am

    Yeah. Getting fcked up on a quarter of a joint is kinda annoying sometimes, depending on the situation.



  49. Mykee Mani on September 29, 2023 at 8:43 am

    So the dude that may Ben& Jerry’s decided he’s going to make shitty weed?



  50. Really really on September 29, 2023 at 8:44 am

    so ice cream and weed?