Ten years ago, Texas-based Blue Bell Creameries L.P. opened a distribution center in West Jacksonville.
Starting with 16 people, it has grown to 40 employees. It also has grown from 8 percent of the market share of ice cream sold in Northeast Florida stores to 15-20 percent, said Branch Manager Doug Lipscomb.
“This was a $21 million market. We made it a $24 million market,” he said. “We increased the pie.”
In other words, while privately held Blue Bell might have taken market share, it also increased the market for all the players.
The 10th anniversary was celebrated at the Jacksonville Suns game April 9. Blue Bell gave Homemade Vanilla and Dutch Chocolate cups to fans at the Baseball Grounds as well as to people attending Disney On Ice at the Arena.
The Westside distribution center along Imeson Road, north of Commonwealth Avenue, distributes Blue Bell products into the display freezers at stores in Northeast Florida and Southeast Georgia.
Blue Bell controls the possession of the products from its manufacturing at one of three plants – headquarters in Brenham, Texas, and in Alabama and Oklahoma - to the time they are placed in freezer cases at the stores.
Private-label brands by the grocers are the top ice cream sellers, Lipscomb said, but Blue Bell is a strong seller, too. The most popular flavor: Homemade Vanilla.
Lipscomb said he built his career along Interstate 10, all with Blue Bell, from Texas to Baton Rouge, New Orleans and then Jacksonville.
He was Blue Bell’s first and only branch manager in Jacksonville, a city he enjoys. “To me, it’s the best city in the state of Florida,” he said.
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