• by Tanya Gazdik , March 5, 2025

Ben & Jerry’s has enlisted EV automaker Rivian to create two electric scoop trucks, which debuted at SXSW in Austin this week. 

The customized Rivian commercial vans will modernize everything people love about an ice cream truck, according to the company.

Following SXSW, the Ben & Jerry's scoop trucks will hit the road and will pop up at Rivian events nationwide and also in Ben & Jerry's home state of Vermont. Part of Ben & Jerry's mission is to use its operations to have a positive impact on its community and the planet.

Working with Rivian, an industry leader that is committed to sustainability, is an ice cream dream come true, said Ben & Jerry's Sean Slattery, U.S. integrated marketing project lead.

”Rivian helped Ben & Jerry's reduce our reliance on fossil fuels in a small way, while making things a little bit cooler...which, as an ice cream company, is extremely difficult to do,” Slattery joked.

Rivian’s recent announcement launching the Rivian commercial van to businesses across the U.S. has helped make these scoop trucks possible, offering solutions to fleet customers looking to transition from fossil fuels.

"Collaborating with the Ben & Jerry's team to build the next generation of electric scoop trucks... is one of those projects that just makes the team smile," said Brian Gase, senior director of prototype development at Rivian, in a release.

Rivian's first commercial partner was Amazon, which aims to put more than 100,000 electric delivery vehicles on the road by 2030. The online retailer began rolling out its electric delivery vans in the summer of 2022 and now has more than 20,000 across the U.S. In 2024, Amazon’s vans from Rivian delivered more than 1 billion packages to customers in the U.S., according to the retailer.

Rivian was at the Detroit Auto Show for the first time in January showing off an unbranded commercial van. 

Jonathan Szczupak, senior director of exterior design at Rivian, was on hand to show journalists around the van during press days. 

“We've been delivering these vans to Amazon for a couple of years now, and this is actually our first non-Amazon-branded one, so we're now selling this van to other fleets,” Szczupak told Marketing Daily. 

Amazon drivers helped influence the design of the vehicle, he said. 

“We did a lot of drive-alongs with them and learned a lot about how they were using it," then worked to eliminate “a lot of the pain points people have with delivery vans in general," he said. "We applied all that into this vehicle.”