A Cincinnati Ice Cream Maker Aims Big

CINCINNATI — Bud Currie wields a metal paddle to furiously transfer thick ice cream crammed with Oreo cookie bits from a two-gallon cylinder into pints that will ship to grocery stores. For eight hours a day, his handiwork is the closest thing to mass production found in a new plant here that makes Graeter’s ice cream, a fourth-generation family brand that is a regional icon with national — if risky — ambitions.

Mr. Currie, Graeter’s head packer, will be busier than ever as Graeter’s, founded in 1870, increases production in the first new plant it has opened since 1934. The company hopes to use the plant to quadruple production and challenge the heavyweights Häagen-Dazs and Ben & Jerry’s nationwide, an ambitious target considering its current distribution is limited to 45 ice cream parlors and pint sales at 1,500 Kroger supermarkets throughout the Midwest, Texas and Colorado. Now, it is heading to the coasts.

Its competitors in the superpremium ice cream segment — generally defined by the industry as having at least 14 percent milk fat and high-quality ingredients — have far greater name recognition and marketing budgets.

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