I. Origin Story
During the pandemic, Matt Sorensen’s kid asked him if he knew how to make ice cream. “I sure don’t, buddy,” he said.
The kid went back to his toys.
An hour later, he came back to his dad and said, “Dad, I want to make some ice cream.” At that point, it became obvious—it’s time to make some ice cream.
Matt had studied chemistry in undergrad, so he wasn’t starting from zero. He and his son made their first batch. It wasn’t great. But the second batch was better, and they had more ice cream than they needed. He messaged his neighbors if they wanted the excess. Of course they said yes (who turns down ice cream?). So they dropped it off at their front door, contactless delivery style. A day later, they found a few dollar bills underneath their doormat. Apparently, it hadn’t been a chore to choke down.
That was the moment that Matt, his wife, and his kid started Flight Ice Creams.
II. The Ice Cream Trojan Horse
Matt and his wife regularly do pop-ups, which is when a restaurant or a brewery or a retail establishment hosts local vendors. Matt built a flight-themed, extremely instagrammable sign that “Departed” means they ran out. “On Time” means it’s in stock.
But the secret move that Matt figured out is that when he’s doing a pop-up, there will be groups of families hanging out together. Matt’s move is almost devious: he gives his own kid a serving of ice cream and encourages him to go sit down in the vicinity of the group. His kid marches over, proudly holding the ice cream, and takes a seat in full view of the other kids. The other kids notice and immediately start tugging on their parent’s coat sleeves. This little move has spurred hundreds of dollars of sales in minutes.
Forget affiliate links and referral codes. A kid with an ice cream cone might be the highest-converting referral engine in existence.
Of course, relying on a single seven-year-old for all your sales isn’t exactly a scalable strategy. Matt needed distribution beyond pop-ups.
III. The Distribution Hack
Running this business has taught Matt more lessons about entrepreneurship than we can fit into this piece. But one breakthrough came from connecting with wedding planners.
One couple asked him to create custom “his and hers” flavors—like a spin on signature wedding cocktails, except in ice cream form. The creativity and experimentation this challenge required was a blast for him. At the event, the couple loved it and all Matt had to do was show up for two hours, hang out with friendly people on a joyous day, and go home with a nice chunk of change in his pocket (the Wedding Industrial Complex is well-funded, so it pays well).
The wedding planner saw how it elevated the event. While individual couples (hopefully) only organize one wedding in their lives, wedding planners oversee scores of weddings. Wedding planners have distribution. That’s the lesson: find the people who talk to your customers more than you ever could.
Whether it’s a kid holding a cone near a crowd or a wedding planner vouching for you in closed-door meetings, proximity moves product. You don’t always need more channels—you just need to be closer to the people who make buying decisions.
Flight Ice Creams: https://www.flighticecreams.com/
Thanks to readers of early drafts: Di G.