Lori Joyce

I was star-struck when I first interviewed Lori Joyce in 2012—she was a Gemini award-winning reality TV star of the W Network show “Cupcake Girls.”  I was interviewing her at Uptown in Saanich, where she and her partner were opening their latest Cupcakes store. Their film crew was on site to capture all the drama, and I was both impressed and intrigued; Lori was charismatic and smart and she had this fearlessness about her that I found intoxicating. 

Fast forward 10 years and I once again have the opportunity to interview this brilliant entrepreneur to talk about her new adventure: Betterwith Ice Cream. 

Why did you decide to start a brand-new business after your incredible success with Cupcakes?

When we finished the show, I had a one-year-old and a newborn. As a new mom, I was really paying attention to ingredient labels—something I had never done before. One day, I was buying the ice cream brand I grew up eating, and as I was reading the label, I realized it wasn’t actually ice cream—it looks like ice cream, it tastes like ice cream, but nowhere on the package did it say it was ice cream. That was really confusing for me as a consumer. As an entrepreneur, that immediately motivated me. 

When did you decide that you wanted to create Betterwith Ice Cream?  

I was like, “I can make a better ice cream.” I grew-up on a farm, and I just ultimately wanted to make an ice cream similar to the kind we made on the farm. Nobody thought this was a good idea. I'm just going to be super frank: I went into this business with my heart. As an entrepreneur that had come out of Cupcakes, which everyone told me wasn't a good idea either, I was gutsy—I just marched in and said I'm going to figure this out.

What were your biggest challenges? 

I didn't understand the grocery game and what it takes to launch consumer packaged products as a small company—and I totally underestimated how hard this actually is. I just really felt that if I could make the world's best ice cream and put it in a pretty package people would buy it. But that's not the way it works. Grocery shelves are like real-estate—you literally need to pay to be on that shelf.

How did you launch without a major investor? 

I have no idea how I had the confidence to do this. I was hustling this ice cream, I had my two kids, I was getting eviction notices—and I realized that this was not sustainable. My parents called me and said, “you need to move back to the farm.” I was in my mid-40s, and I thought that if I moved back, that's admitting failure, right? But I didn't have a choice; I knew that this was the best ice cream and I knew I needed time, so I made the decision to move back home, and that's when everything changed.

How did moving back to the farm on Vancouver Island impact your business?

The minute I drove off the ferry, I felt this incredible energy. As I was coming off the ramp, I heard this voice say, “this is your home and this the right thing to do.” When things are so unstable around you, you're very sensitive and everything is survival—every day you're just holding on. And when I came home, I had this feeling deep down inside in my gut that this was the right decision. 

Your dad said something to you that really impacted you—can you share that?

My dad's a tough judge, and he would have been the first to tell me that this was not a good idea and to get a job if he didn’t believe in what I was doing. He wasn't pulling the favour card—he believed in me, and he believed in Betterwith. On a particularly challenging day, my dad pulled me aside and looked me in the eyes and said, “we have your back, the farm has your back.” His belief in me, and my parents’ support, is incredible. 

How did you create a buzz around a new product during a pandemic? 

Demos were a big part of my marketing strategy when I launched, but when the pandemic hit, I had to pivot. The gift of the pandemic was that people were eating lots and lots of ice cream and discovering Betterwith for the first time. 

What kind of responses are you getting from customers? 

People love it! They love that it has real cream and that the ingredients are real. I have received a ton of emails from people who tell me they can eat ice cream for the first time in years because the ingredients are natural. Lactose-sensitive people or people with gastric issues have no symptoms eating Betterwith Ice Cream. Strangers will come up to me in the grocery store and hug me and say “thank you—I can finally eat ice cream again,” and I'm really proud of that.