Making Fresher Ice Cream Led to Sweet Success for This Founder

“Ice cream has always been a special thing to me,” says Smitten founder Robyn Sue Fisher. “Since I was a little girl, my mom used to tell me I had two tummies, and one tummy was solely reserved for ice cream.”

Even after earning an MBA degree and working as a management consultant, Robyn couldn’t stop fantasizing about her dream job: innovating ice cream. Robyn road-tripped across the country in search of the perfect scoop. When she didn’t find it, she decided to make it herself, with the help of a little science. (Related: Solving Your Own Problem Can Be a Brilliant Business Idea. Really)

She collaborated with a NASA engineer to create a prototype for a new type of ice cream maker that uses extremely cold liquid nitrogen. When a customer picks a flavor, the treat is made to order in the machine. It takes about a minute. Ice cream made at this super-cold temperature is much smoother and denser than conventional versions because ice particles can’t form within it. (Those particles make it feel gritty.) And because the ice cream is churned fresh, Smitten can avoid using stabilizers, gums, and other unpronounceable ingredients. Today, Smitten has six shops in the Bay Area and Southern California.

In the latest episode of my podcast, Unstoppable, Robyn talks about how she reinvented an old-school product.   

Lesson #1: Never compromise your ideals.

Robyn’s stamp of idealism is found on everything she does. After studying the ice cream industry’s status quo, she realized the bar for quality was extremely low. Most of the ice cream we buy is made to last 18 months and is filled with preservatives, stabilizers and other chemicals. 

“This industry, to me, should be all about love and joy and innocence, but it’s really, really tainted,” she says. “My goal with Smitten was to reverse engineer everything to make [ice cream] live up to and exceed the ideals of the category.” 

Everything from how Smitten’s ice cream is made to its impact on the environment lives up to Robyn’s ideals. She's stayed committed to sourcing her ingredients from local farmers with ethical and sustainable practices, even as the company grows. 

Lesson #2: If you build it, they will come.

For nearly two years, Robyn and an engineer worked together in a basement to perfect her innovative ice cream maker. She wanted to churn fresh ingredients into ice cream faster than it takes to make a latte. 

Eventually, she built the first version of the Brrr?, Smitten’s proprietary machine that churns ice cream in about 90 seconds. To test out her invention, Robyn would wheel the ice cream maker around San Francisco on a little red wagon and tweet out her location. (Sometimes, she parked it near potential angel investors so they could see it firsthand.) Robyn was able to get on-the-ground-experience and see how people reacted to the product and learn what they really wanted. The little wagon became so popular that she was able to open a brick and mortar location. 

Lesson #3: It takes a village.  

Robyn’s journey from a one-woman wagon shop to an ice cream empire was made easier by supportive friends, family and investors. In the early days, friends would help her sell ice cream. Robyn’s boyfriend (now husband) worked the cash register and would fix the machine if it broke. 

Later on, Robyn leveraged the support of investors—both men and women. “It's just a different understanding of what it's like to be a woman in business,” she says. “And be a woman who can care about your family and still lead with power and confidence.” (Related: Dear Investors and Founders: Here’s How to Get the Most Out of This Unique Relationship)

She also applauds the investors who are paying attention to more women-led businesses. “I’ve been able to work with some amazing male investors,” she says. “And interestingly, a lot of my investors also have daughters and they see investing in women as a way of making sure that their daughters have more opportunities in the future.”  

Tune into my latest podcast episode, #31, to hear more how Smitten changed the ice cream status quo, one fresh scoop at a time.

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Let’s Connect! Find me onTwitter(@KaraGoldin), and DM me your burning business questions and/or comments.

Kara Goldin is the founder and CEO of San Francisco–basedhint?, a healthy lifestyle brand that produces the leading unsweetened flavored water and a scented sunscreen spray that’s oxybenzone- and paraben-free. Listen to her podcast,Unstoppable, where she interviews founders, entrepreneurs, and disruptors across various industries and keep up with her onTwitter,Facebook, andInstagram.