William P. Hobby Airport served up cookies and cake during the celebration of its 80th anniversary. Now Blue Bell is serving up the ice cream to celebrate its 100th anniversary and some of it is being whisked through the system at George Bush Intercontinental Airport (IAH). The famed Texas Company, headquartered in Brenham, Texas serves more than 50 flavors of the sweet delicacy to customers all over the United States, including Alaska and Hawaii. “We ship Blue Bell to our customer’s overnight,” says Blue Bell public relations coordinator, Jenny Anderson. “We ship it exclusively by Federal Express. It’s packed in a cooler, then surrounded by dry ice and boxed up with all the documents and we ship it by plane when ever we need to.” Federal Express is a huge presence at Bush; representatives say the company flies four all-cargo wide body aircraft in and outbound each day. Those flights carry roughly 350,000 pounds of parcels, freight and mail inbound and roughly 275,000 pounds outbound each day. Federal Express moves an additional 100,000 pounds in and out of the airport each day via truck, according to representatives. Some of those parcels include Blue Bell ice cream, as part of an exclusive relationship that has lasted more than a decade and a half. “We worked with Blue Bell to create packaging that would keep their products cold in transit, and the FedEx system is designed to offer reliable, overnight service,” says Rick Siciliano, market manager for Federal Express at IAH.

They eat al they can and sell the rest, many of it through Bush Intercontinental Airport.

 The Houston Metropolitan market is so strong that Federal Express operates out of its own facility at Bush.

In the Blue Bell case, containers filled with four half gallons of the customers favorite ice cream are routinely trucked to Bush from the Blue Bell Creameries in Brenham. The fee for the overnight service is $89 dollars, which includes shipping. The gift pack orders are processed Monday through Wednesday via Federal Express for next day delivery.

Blue Bell promises the dedicated desert hounds they will “get the best ice cream in the country to you or someone else who can’t get it otherwise.”

Under normal circumstance the ice cream should remain frozen for up to 36 hours, “it’s a tricky process,” says Anderson, “but that dry ice is pretty amazing.”

For Willie Bingaman and Diego Parra, supervisors of cargo at Bush airport, ice cream isn’t the only challenging cargo oddity flowing thru the system. In the brand new IAH CargoCenter more than 900 freight forwarders are currently operating.

The products there run the gamut, from armor plated trucks headed for Iraq, to car prototypes from some of the most elite vehicle manufacturers in the world. Throw in some clothing, computer parts and equipment, drilling and exploration machinery and you’ll discover that a veritable potpourri of products passes through the cargo center.

“We’ve seen it all and we’ve got someone out here at this airport who can handle it all ,” says Bingaman.

Whatever the product there’s a spot for it at IAH, party planner central when it comes to ice cream cravings from Blue Bell and they’re excited about the celebration.

“I mean not a lot of companies make it that far and ice cream is fun. We have a good story to tell,” says Paul Kruse, Blue Bell president and CEO. “We try to do everything right, we use the good, fresh ingredients and we want to deliver value to the customer.”

Happy Anniversary Blue Bell, you came to the right place.

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