History
MaggieMoo's was founded in Kansas City, Kansas by Juel and Katherine Tillery. After deciding to open an ice cream store they were searching for a name. They named their store after a cow on a farm that they passed by every day whom their young daughter affectionally named "MaggieMoo". The Tillerys enjoyed great success in their initial store and began to launch a franchise program. By 1996 there were approximately 10 units open, mostly in Kansas City, but also in St. Louis, Wichita, Topeka, Des Moines, and Lincoln.
Facing franchisee issues and lack of capital, the Tillerys sold the company to a group of investors led by Richard J. Sharoff who became the CEO. Sharoff was a veteran of the food and franchise industry having previously been a 30 store franchisee of Boston Market and president of Vie de France. Sharoff moved the headquarters to Columbia, Maryland, proceeded to open two new company units in nearby Northern Virginia, and built a team of franchisee professionals. The company chose Kansas City cartoonist Charlie Podrebarac to create the MaggieMoo character, logo, and the "Tail of MaggieMoo", the story about "SpokesMaggie". The franchise program continued to grow and the chain celebrated its 100th unit opening in Phoenix, Arizona in 2003.
Sharoff left the company in 2003 and was succeeded by John Jamison. In February 2007 the company was sold to NexCen Brands, Inc. for a reported $16 million. Global Franchise Group acquired NexCen in July 2010.
Read more about this topic: Maggie Moo's Ice Cream And Treatery
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“A people without history
Is not redeemed from time, for history is a pattern
Of timeless moments.”
—T.S. (Thomas Stearns)
“I am ashamed to see what a shallow village tale our so-called History is. How many times must we say Rome, and Paris, and Constantinople! What does Rome know of rat and lizard? What are Olympiads and Consulates to these neighboring systems of being? Nay, what food or experience or succor have they for the Esquimaux seal-hunter, or the Kanaka in his canoe, for the fisherman, the stevedore, the porter?”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“We know only a single science, the science of history. One can look at history from two sides and divide it into the history of nature and the history of men. However, the two sides are not to be divided off; as long as men exist the history of nature and the history of men are mutually conditioned.”
—Karl Marx (1818–1883)