EAST LANSING — Your face is covered in sweat and your eyes squint to stay open — to keep the sting away as the 85-degree July sun bakes your arms a medium-rare red. You decide to head inside. To the AC. To the freezer, where you find a cardboard carton of your favorite frozen pint: mint chocolate chip.
It’s cold and you’re warm, sweat painting an ugly circle on your Hanes t-shirt.
You worry about the high calories and sugar content labeled on the ice cream’s back, a tag you don’t want to read. You close the fridge. You don’t eat the ice cream, frowning as you walk back outside.
You're still sweating.
Worry no more because best friends Paul Reiss and Michael Meadows have a frozen food concoction that won’t make you feel guilty while cooling you off — Protein Pints ice cream, recipient of Michigan State University (MSU) Product Center’s 2024 Young Innovator of the Year.
READ NEXT: MSU PRODUCT CENTER AWARDS PROTEIN PINTS AS THE '2024 YOUNG INNOVATOR OF THE YEAR'
Reiss is a senior at MSU majoring in entrepreneurship in the Broad College of Business. Meadows is the production and operations assistant at the MSU Product Center. The two met on a school bus in Hudsonville when they were kids — before they became business partners in 2022.
“We’ve always loved ice cream; we’re from Hudsonville, Michigan, which is known for Hudsonville Ice Cream,” said Meadows, a cofounder of Protein Pints. “We grew up eating that quite a bit.”
So much so that Reiss still eats ice cream twice a day. Yet, as individuals who work out every day, Reiss and Meadows couldn’t find protein ice cream at the grocery story; ice cream that wasn’t high in sugar and calories, and low in protein.
They bought an ice cream maker in February of 2022, where they experimented with whey powder, milk and sweetener. They trial-and-errored on 30 different ice creams — starting with cookies and cream and cookie dough — before ending up with four flavors: vanilla, chocolate, strawberry and peanut butter chip.
“That’s when we realized we had like a really cool concept that nobody was doing,” Meadows, 23, told Michigan Farm News.
A pint of Ben & Jerry’s vanilla ice cream contains 6 grams of protein and 330 calories per serving.
Protein Pints contains 30 grams of protein and 135 calories per serving.
According to a report from Fortune Business Insights, the global protein supplements market reached $26.1 billion in 2023 and is expected to grow to $55.32 billion by 2032.
“We’re looking for things that were better for our health, which kind of meant we had to back off the ice cream quite a bit,” said Reiss, 23, a cofounder of Protein Pints. “We were looking for that higher protein amount, but we didn’t really like the shakes and the bars. So we really didn’t eat them, and we weren’t getting enough protein.”
In 2023, Reiss and Meadows met Chris McKellar, owner of Love’s Ice Cream & Chocolate in Grand Rapids. At first they wanted a job at the hand-crafted ice cream shop to learn more about the industry. However, they explained their plan — this dream — to McKellar, and he became a business partner.
Today, Protein Pints manufactures 1,000 pints during a given production run at a facility near MSU’s Dairy Store, where the product is sold. It can also be purchased at 10 Meijer Supercenters across Michigan and Love’s Ice Cream & Chocolate. Other locations can be found here.
“We really pride ourselves on bringing in milk from Michigan-based sources,” Meadows said.
“All of our protein comes from whey protein isolate, which is a really high-quality source of protein that you see in other supplements. Beyond that, we don’t use any artificial sweeteners and a very low ingredient count to keep it as healthy as possible.”
An American supercenter chain, Meijer also believes it’s important to support local entrepreneurs.
“Not only are Paul and Michael’s dedication and enthusiasm for their brand inspiring, but they also bring innovation to this category as protein remains a more sought-after nutritional aspect in food today,” said Monica Nevenzel, a Buyer at Meijer. “Helping to grow Protein Pints has been a wonderful opportunity as their entire brand leans into this trend while offering our customers a great tasting frozen treat.”
Your face is no longer covered in sweat.
You aren’t worried about calories or if what you’re eating is healthy.
You take your spoon and dip into the vanilla goodness.
You close your eyes and sigh: You have a pint of Reiss and Meadows’ ice cream.
“The resources here for starting an ice cream company have been unmatched,” Reiss said.
“We wanted to eat ice cream every day. Like — we love ice cream. I remember thinking that we could only eat it once a week or every few weeks. That — dang — I wish I could eat ice cream every day.”
Fueled by a desire for a better diet — and a better protein ice cream — Reiss and Meadows now can.
They now do.