While Neve loves their work—and not just because his wife is from the brand’s home state of Vermont—“it was more just about, ‘How can I take something I love and do more of that?’”

Neve, whose day job is director of finance at North Carolina-based independent agency The Variable, began experimenting in his kitchen right before the pandemic, “just having fun with it.” That turned into a weeklong course at the local factory of Italian ice cream equipment maker Carpigiani, taught by a woman who had operated her own scoop shop for 30 years.