This Is Where Trader Joe's Sources Its Ice Cream From

Who really supplies Trader Joe's ice cream? The store, which rarely sells name brand products, is known for stamping its name on nearly all its products and being tight-lipped about its sourcing. But in 2023, a Reddit poster with the username CookieButterLovers wrote that the ice cream containers have plant codes printed on them that can be matched up to factories from specific third-party manufacturers, using sources like Where Is My Milk From, a site that compiles info from the FDA. 

The user said they'd found multiple Trader Joe's brand ice creams featuring PLT 06-1187, the official plant code of Crystal Creamery, a.k.a. Humboldt Creamery. Flavors identified include French Vanilla, featured in Chowhound's ranking of popular vanilla ice creams, and Fudgy Cookie Dough. Other Redditors have also claimed they've used the same method to confirm Crystal/Humboldt is the producer. 

Crystal/Humboldt Creamery is located in Fortuna, California. Founded by George Knox in 1901, it describes itself as the state's oldest and largest private dairy processor. It was acquired by Foster Dairy Farms in 2007. The creamery prides itself on making fresh, natural ice cream that doesn't contain artificial ingredients, high-fructose corn syrup, mono and diglycerides, or milk from cows that have been given the synthetic hormone rBST. 

Additional sources have claimed Pierre's Ice Cream Company is the maker of other Trader Joe's-label frozen dairy desserts. In 2023, a Redditor with the humorous username dont_listen2me wrote, "I do know that the Cookie Butter Ice Cream is made by Pierre's," but didn't specify how they knew. Pierre's has been based in Cleveland, Ohio since its founding by Alexander "Pierre" Basset in 1932. It was among the first ice cream makers to be recognized with the industry's highest certification for food safety and quality.

Other consumer beliefs regarding the sources of Trader Joe's frozen dairy desserts are less grounded in hard evidence but based on secondhand reports or sensory experience. In an April 2026 post, Instagram user Malachi Wilkinson alleged, "I recently found out that Trader Joe's ice cream is made at the Humboldt creamery ... because a coworker of mine's [sic] cousin works there and had some extras he brought to the school for us." Wilkinson shared a photo of the TJ's Banana Pudding ice cream, fueling further speculation about which flavors are made by the creamery. 

Another Redditor thinks certain TJ's flavors, specifically Maple Salted Caramel, taste suspiciously similar to those made by Tillamook and has a hunch that company is making ice cream for the grocer. Oregon-based Tillamook has been producing the dairy-based dessert since 1909, when it was founded by multiple creameries as a co-op. And a 2020 SFGate article investigated rumors that Double Rainbow, founded in 1976 in San Francisco, was the maker of multiple TJ's ice creams. A journalist called the company, and an employee who spoke anonymously said they couldn't freely divulge that information but suggested a taste test. 

Trader Joe's reportedly has a history of using third-party producers. Former employee Mackenzie Filson wrote a piece for The Kitchn in which she stated the company routinely partners with some of the world's biggest food manufacturers to produce goods under its own label and specifications. In a 2017 Eater article, Filson's claims were corroborated by Mark Gardiner, another former Trader Joe's crew member, who stated most of TJ's foods are made by third-party manufacturers who enter into secret agreements with the grocer.