Ice cream is a particular bitch to scale; it seems. Look at Blue Bell. Either you lose the delicate fats (fake ice cream blah) or you get contamination problems, or you stay small batch.
I'm guessing most people just aren't willing to pay $8 for a quart of real ice cream when there's "almost" ice cream for $3.
It's not like mega-ice cream companies like Breyers don't already have an army of chemists, food scientists and mechanical engineers on staff to solve these problems - and yet they still have a tough time producing real ice cream at everyday prices.
The silicon valley wiz-bang startup crowd often forgets... sometimes an industry's incumbents are not lazy and incompetent.
If it's covered up by flavoring/sugar, then it may be hard to notice the difference. But if you just have vanilla or chocolate (with chips, nuts, etc.) then I think it's pretty easy to tell the difference.
In addition to some of the premium brands you mentioned, are there other even higher-end labels? And what is it, experientially, I should be looking for? What are the signs, good and bad, in the ingredients list of proper ice cream?
She is the founder of Jeni’s, which is probably the highest-end ice cream I’ve come across.
I look for the fewest ingredients. If I see preservatives or coloring I generally don't buy it. Haagen Daaz is one of the few national brands that is really good about that. Jeni's is really good IMO
I still felt a rush when I wrote those lines, and its been 5 years.