Thank you, 2016!

Is it just us or did this year seem to evaporate before our very eyes? It truly seems like it was only a week or so ago we were welcoming 2016 with open arms.

I’ve been thinking about how to sum up how this past year went for us here at Lick Honest Ice Creams. So much happened! We celebrated our fifth birthday, we relocated our original scoop shop just up the road to Lamar Union, we created eighteen new flavors, we brought back oldies but goodies, we partnered with SRSLY Chocolate on all of our chocolate flavors and even a chocolate bar, we introduced new bowls from Foxwares Ceramics, we began selling our ice creams online via Foody Direct, and we began construction on our fourth scoop shop at Mueller in East Austin.

All of these accomplishments made us all extremely proud and thankful. They are most likely the reason this year seemed like the shortest of my life to date. But when I was asked recently to reflect on this year, the first thing that surfaced in my mind was the work we were fortunate enough to do this past year with local organizations. At the start of 2016, we set out with the goal of increasing the amount of money we raise annually for the organizations that support and serve the communities we lovingly call home. That is after all one of the main reasons Chad and I stared Lick Honest Ice Creams.

We donated and scooped ice cream at the Ronald McDonald houses in Austin and San Antonio and donated a portion of the sales on National Ice Cream Day to this amazing organization. We committed the sales on the night of re-opening our South Lamar shop to Hill Country Ride For Aids and continued to take up donations for those fine folks throughout our opening week. We also donated all of the profits from our fifth birthday party, Lick’s Ladies of the 80’s, to HCRA. For Sustainable Food Center, we donated 100% of the sales of our Fromage and Fig flavor and gave the profits from our Ice Cream Making workshop at Kettle and Brine. On one of the hottest days of the year, we teamed up with Metier Cook’s Supply and Save the World Brewery and sold our ice cream sandwiches all to benefit Becker Elementary’s Green Classroom. Sprinkled throughout the year were donations to Austin Pets Alive, E.A.S.T. and H.A.A.M. When you add all of these up, we raised just over $14,000.00 in cash for local organizations. Please pat yourselves on the back as we could not have raised a single dollar without the support of our enthusiastic and loyal customers.

I share this with you all not to boast, although I am proud of this accomplishment, but as an example of how a little bit can add up to a lot. If I had been asked to give a realistic number I thought we could raise during 2016, it would have been lower than what we raised. Don’t get me wrong, on days when it’s 38 degrees outside, my mind begins to think of how that money could come in handy but those thoughts are quickly squashed when I look at the thank you cards on my wall and remember the good that was done.

We are in the thick of the holiday season and it’s sometimes easy to lose sight of the meaning of this time of year. Many people will say that there is no meaning left and that the holidays have simply become a retail-centric and materialistic celebration. I certainly could have used this post to push our holiday flavors or merchandise but we all have a choice to decide what this season means to each of us. To all of us here, this time of year is a season of thanks and giving. That being said, our wish at Lick this holiday season is that you contribute to one of your favorite organizations. I know y’all can do it because you’ve already helped us give so much back this year!

For us, being able to give back more than we had hoped was our greatest gift and accomplishment of 2016.

So in closing for this year, I’ll just say THANK YOU.