— by Kate Oden

10/17/24

In less than 10 years, Shelburne, VT’s Sisters of Anarchy has gone from a few old-fashioned ice cream tumblers to stocking shelves in about 100 retail locations across New England.

Their secret? Marketing savvy and knowing their audience. “Our unique niche is that we try to grow and make as many flavor elements as possible,” owner Becky Castle, 54, said in a phone interview.

Currently, they grow about 35,000 row-feet of six fruits on their Shelburne, Vermont farm. They also make all baked goods from scratch in their small production facility on site. That includes brownies for certain flavors and cookies for ice cream sandwiches, like their chocolate-molasses Snap Sis’wich.

Not surprisingly, Upper Valley seller Chuck Wooster of White River Junction’s Sunrise Farm guesses that “very little of their ice cream makes it home.” Wooster sells Sisters of Anarchy ice cream sandwiches and single-serve cups (which come with a classic wooden spoon).

The Snap Sis’wich, a chocolate-molasses cookie sandwich with vanilla ice cream, was the best of their products I tried, with a comfortable price point of $3.50 at Sunrise Farm. It was divine. The Chocolate Anarchy flavor was also highly satisfying. Some other flavors I tried were a little uneven – I wanted to love their blueberry flavor, Crystal Blue Persuasion, but it just wasn’t a hit.

About six flavors of Sisters of Anarchy ice cream are available at Upper Valley retailers like Sunrise Farm, Dan & Whit’s, the Co-Op Food Stores, and the dining hall at the Tuck School of Business in Hanover. Pints go for $10.49 at the Co-Op, so it’s more like buying a couple cones at a premium scoop shop than buying a pint of Ben & Jerry’s.

Kevin Birdsey, Frozen Goods Specialist at the Co-Op, said in an email, “Truthfully, we have found it a bit challenging to find the right customer for the brand” and finds that the single-serve cups sell better at their lower price. “Many local ice cream brands hang their hat on the milk, which is important,” wrote Birdsey, “but Sisters was a chance to tell a slightly different story” with their Vermont farm berries and baked goods.

Sisters of Anarchy is named for Castle and husband Bob Clark’s three children, who would now prefer to be called the Siblings of Anarchy. “I told them the ice cream would remain Sisters of Anarchy,” Castle said.

Castle and Clark, 58, began making ice cream in White Mountain Creamery tumblers with bag ice and rock salt. That was in 2016; they produced a total of about 30 gallons a week.

To get an idea of their current production numbers, multiply that initial 30 gallons a week by about six – 170-some gallons made for scooping – and add a few hundred each of pints, sandwiches, and single-serve cups per week.

In all, Castle estimates they move over 200,000 packaged ice cream products a year. All this from a 4,000-square-foot red barn Castle and Clark built for the purpose in 2016.

They’ve just added a second walk-in freezer and plan to launch pies and hand pies by early 2025. These will initially be available only on their website, where they also sell pints, including some available only online—like Beefy Blonde, a mix of Vermont maple ice cream with bacon and farm-grown blueberries.

Sisters of Anarchy ships ice cream anywhere in the U.S., including Hawai’i and Alaska. Boxes arrive with pints nestled between five-pound bricks of wrapped dry ice. The method promises a cold product and minimizes packaging waste.

“We suggest people just throw the dry ice on their lawn to sublimate,” says Castle. She explains that the dry ice bricks are made from captured CO2 and do not contribute to larger emissions volumes.

Sustainability is important to Castle and Clark. They purchase their energy from a solar farm in Pittsburgh, VT. Castle calls it a “nice intermediate step” for small-scale operations like theirs that can’t currently afford their own solar installation.

In their fields – where they grow aronia berries, blackberries, blueberries, elderberries, grapes, and red and yellow raspberries – Castle and Clark practice irrigation and fertigation, or centralized fertilization, that has kept their water and fertilizer usage in careful check.

Their farm in Shelburne has received a USDA Conservation Stewardship grant for its practice of mulching with pine chips. “Pine bark mulch adds acidity—which our plants love—and organic matter, and it suppresses weeds,” explains Castle.

“I think a lot of sustainability practices just make good sense,” she elaborates. The farm now uses an innovative trellis system for its bramble berries that Castle suspects is unique in Vermont.