Yogurt on a mission
Yogurt on a mission from Stonyfield on Vimeo.
Back in 1983, Stonyfield Farm began with seven cows in a leaky barn on a windswept farm in western New Hampshire. Our start was rough. Gary likes to say that business was great in the early days, except that there was no supply and no demand. Cash was also in dangerously short supply, and what there was, was borrowed from relatives and a group of local nuns. Trucks broke down, power blackouts were common, and payrolls were often impossible to meet. That didn’t stop founders Samuel Kaymen and Gary Hirshberg though. Perhaps Winston Churchill had Stonyfield in mind when he said, ”Success consists of going from failure to failure without any loss of enthusiasm.”
What was plentiful besides enthusiasm was hard work and long hours. More than 25 years later, Stonyfield Farm is the world’s leading organic yogurt maker, but Gary reminds us what it was like back then, milking cows by hand when the generator failed, making late-night phone calls to in-laws to borrow just another five thousand dollars, and sneaking yogurt cups into unsuspecting shoppers’ carts as a marketing strategy. What hasn’t changed is our commitment to healthy food, healthy people, and a healthy planet.
