Ben & Jerry’s Spat with Unilever Resolved

Dec. 16, 2022

Dispute was over selling ice cream in Israeli-occupied territories.

The lawsuit brought by Ben & Jerry’s against parent company Unilever over sales in Israeli-occupied territory has been resolved, Unilever said in a terse announcement.

The statement on Unilever’s website, dated Dec. 15, reads in its entirety: “Unilever is pleased to announce that the litigation with Ben & Jerry’s Independent Board has been resolved.” No other details were offered.

Ben & Jerry’s had been locked in a dispute with Unilever over the issue of selling ice cream in the Middle Eastern territories occupied by Israel. Ben & Jerry’s, which has an independent board, had moved to ban such sales in 2021, but Unilever thwarted this by selling its Israeli business, including the occupied territories, to a local distributor. Ben & Jerry’s then sued in July to stop Unilever from selling ice cream in the territories. The suit was thrown out the following month, but the Ben & Jerry’s board filed another complaint soon afterward.

About the Author

Pan Demetrakakes | Senior Editor

Pan has written about the food and beverage industry for more than 25 years. His areas of coverage have included formulations, processing, packaging, marketing and retailing. Pan worked for Food Processing Magazine for six years in the 1990s, where he was operations editor (his current role), touring dozens of food plants of every description. He has also worked for Packaging and Food & Beverage Packaging magazines, the latter as chief editor, during which he won three ASBPE awards. He is a graduate of Stanford University with a BA in communications.