The Good Food CFO podcast · The Good Food CFO

BABOYOT with Joe Nicchi of CVT Soft Serve: Packaging Innovation, Avoiding Trends, and the Power of Luck

·45 min·3 clips

Gelson's took CVT at full price, and Joe says the launch hit 120 units per store per week.

1. The Good Food CFO podcast episode centers on CVT Soft Serve, Joe Nicchi's Los Angeles brand built around soft serve and packaging innovation. 2. Sarah Delavan hosts, Chelsea Steer produces, and Joe Nicchi is the founder of CVT Soft Serve, a cult-favorite ice cream company with trucks, wholesale, and retail pouches. 3. The episode asks how a nostalgic soft-serve product moved from LA trucks to national retail without losing margins or brand identity. 4. Joe says he started CVT in March 2014 after moving from upstate New York to Los Angeles and not finding the soft serve he wanted. 5. He describes Los Angeles as image-conscious and says he complained that local options were mostly frozen yogurt or McDonald's soft serve. 6. He says the company began with trucks, then got pulled into TV and film catering, which led to a second truck. 7. Joe says he spent years working Los Angeles events, school treats, and local press lists like the LA Times, LA Weekly, and LA Magazine. 8. He explains that the brand later sold jugs of ice cream to colleges and restaurants, including places like the Queen Mary, breweries, and schools. 9. Joe says the idea for retail pouches came after a residential install for Jeff Bezos, which showed him that people wanted soft serve at home. 10. He says the pouch launch in May 2023 reached close to 3,000 stores in just over two years. 11. Joe describes testing the pouch idea with empty breast milk storage bags and a prop master-made prototype before a production line existed. 12. He says baby-food and applesauce manufacturers were not a fit because they wanted high volume and the wrong production setup. 13. He says he ultimately found a cream manufacturer and a machine rental arrangement, then raised a family-and-friends round on a SAFE. 14. Joe says Gelson's accepted CVT without promotion, at full price, after being impressed by both the product and the Live Nation angle. 15. He says the launch hit 120 units per store per week, compared with a category average he was told was 7 to 10 units per store per week. 16. He says that regional loyalty in Southern California helped the product spread, with customers calling stores and buying by the case. 17. The tone is practical and founder-to-founder, with Sarah pushing into retail, trade spend, and margin details while Joe answers in process-heavy detail. 18. The pacing stays conversational and specific, moving from truck origins to pouches, Live Nation, and grocery execution without much abstraction. 19. People building food brands, especially regional CPG brands, would get the most from this episode. 20. Listeners wanting a broad lifestyle interview rather than retail and margin mechanics may skip it.

As heard by us

Nostalgia, prototypes, and financing, all folded into one founder story.

Joe's conversation on The Good Food CFO Podcast reads as a business story first, with CBT Soft Serve's East Coast nostalgia giving it a personal hook before it moves into product, expansion, and the awkward reality of pitching while production is still catching up.

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Why you'd press play

If you want East Coast nostalgia and the startup grind behind a cult ice cream truck, press play.

Read the full recommendation in PlayNext →

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