Long before “Buy Local” was a movement or trending on Twitter®, Casper’s Ice Cream was sourcing goods about local as one could get. In 1925, Casper Merrill took the milk and cream from the family’s dairy cows and created the “original” Ice Cream Nut Sundae on a Stick in a tengallon milk can and sold them at the local Independence Day celebration.

Flash forward 90 years and the universally-loved “FatBoy” Ice Cream Sandwich is a phenomenon—sold and enjoyed in all 50 States across the nation. And the practice of locally-sourced, first-rate ingredients remains key to the company’s success.

Paul Merrill, Casper’s Chief Executive Officer and grandson of the FatBoy founder, said the recipe for success entails “staying close to our roots and putting the consumer first.” For Casper’s this means holding close to the original recipes with quality ingredients, sourcing locally as much as possible, and keeping the novelties a true FatBoy size portion.

The success has naturally lead to growth, and when the company needed financing for a new building and equipment to support the national demand for its products, Merrill said Mountain West Small Business Finance provided just the solution he was looking for. “I had researched SBA loans, and Mountain West looked like an outfit that could team up with my local bank. They were just easy to work with,” Merrill said.

He also liked that the deal with the SBA helped to limit his and the bank’s risk. A project with a fixed rate for 20 years made much more sense than what the banks alone could offer.

The new 26,272-square-foot building adjacent to their current warehouse and production facility in Richmond, Utah added 20 more jobs in the rural community where Casper’s already employs 100 people. But that’s not the end of the tale. In a breaking scoop, Merrill says he’s already in talks with Mountain West about the next
phase of expansion.

For Everything, There is a First Time

A recurring theme among Trekkies in later years, mostly as the later Original Series Movies came out, was – “How long can these old guys go?” At some point, Captain Kirk wasn’t able to run around, dive and roll on the ground, and intimidate the bad aliens of the universe. When that time came, Captain Kirk became Admiral Kirk.

And so it is at Mountain West. In January the Board of Directors approved making Scott Davis the Admiral and promoting John Evans to Captain.

Scott Davis, the founder of Mountain West, now has the title Chief Executive Officer, and John Evans is the President.