Breyers is an ice cream and frozen dessert brand with headquarters in Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey. Since 1993, Breyers was owned and managed by the British conglomerate, Unilever, which incorporated Breyers with other Unilever ice cream brands into the Magnum Ice Cream Company in 2025.
Breyers makes ice cream and frozen dairy desserts. Its products range from traditional dairy desserts to those for specialty diet concerns, such as sugar-free, gluten-free, dairy-free, and vegan. and was fourth among American brands in 2022 with sales of $498 million. Founded in 1866, Breyers is the oldest manufacturer of ice cream in the United States.
History
thumb|Breyer ice cream truck, c. 1915
In 1866, William A. Breyer began to produce and sell ice cream in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Breyers is the oldest manufacturer of ice cream in the United States. The ice cream was originally hand-cranked and made from cream, sugar, fruit, and nuts. By 1918, the company produced one million gallons of ice cream annually. In 1930, National Dairy Products purchased the company that later become known as Kraft in 1976. Kraft sold its ice cream brands to Unilever in 1993.
In 1993, Unilever merged the Breyers ice cream brand with Gold Bond and Good Humor ice cream to create the Good Humor-Breyers division.
In 2013, Unilever introduced frozen dairy desserts, made with additional ingredients and less butterfat, having created this category to provide low-calorie products. The new desserts provoked complaints from some customers who preferred the brand's all-natural ice cream products.
Market size
With $498 million in sales in 2022, Breyers was fourth among American brands. becoming part of the $9 billion Magnum Ice Cream Company in 2025.
The Magnum Ice Cream Company
In July 2025, Breyers and other major ice cream brands owned by Unilever, such as Magnum, Ben & Jerry's, and Wall's, were demerged from Unilever into a stand-alone company called The Magnum Ice Cream Company, becoming the world's largest ice cream company with headquarters in Amsterdam, Netherlands.
On 8 December 2025, The Magnum Ice Cream Company became a publicly traded company using the symbol MICC on the Amsterdam, London, and New York Stock Exchanges, having an initial market value of $9.1 billion.
Products
Breyers markets its frozen desserts as either "original ice cream" or "frozen dairy dessert". Some 60% of Breyers products are ice cream and 40% are frozen dairy desserts.
Confusion with Dreyer's
In the Western United States, Breyers ice cream may be confused with Dreyer's ice cream, the company cofounded by William Dreyer and Joseph Edy as Edy's Grand Ice Cream in 1928 in Oakland, California. The root of the confusion dates to 1948 when the Edy's Grand Ice Cream name was changed to "Dreyer's Grand Ice Cream".