Unlike Bartles & Jaymes—a fictional duo concocted by the Gallo Winery to sell wine coolers—Ben & Jerry are real people. As the story goes, pals Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield followed their dream by opening a small ice cream parlor in Vermont in 1978. After a very successful decade later, they were given the nation’s Small Business Persons of the Year Award by President Ronald Reagan. Even as the brand has grown in leaps and bounds, it has retained an independent feel, supporting environmental initiatives and progressive issues such as same-sex marriage, while also regularly launching quirky ice cream flavors named for arts festivals, musicians, and the like. What the brand hasn’t retained is independent ownership. Since 2000, Ben & Jerry’s has been a subsidiary of European conglomerate Unilever, which also owns brands such as Slim Fast, BrylCreem, Lipton, and Vaseline.