companyThe Profit · Season 4, Episode 17 · Aired July 18, 2017
Hip Pops
South Florida, Florida
Still open. It kept its doors open after the show.
What happened after
Gelato-pop maker; pivoted from planned storefront/retail model to a mobile POPtruck + catering + local dropoff-delivery model, operating across Florida and Colorado.
What happened on the show
Hip Pops was a gelato popsicle company whose owner, as the episode put it, jumped the gun by launching a franchise business before the concept was proven. It made a distinctive frozen dessert, a gelato pop, and the founder's eagerness to franchise ahead of a solid foundation was exactly the sort of premature scaling Marcus repeatedly warned against on the show. The typical fix in a case like this was to pull the owner back to first principles, prove the unit economics and the product in a controlled way before selling the dream to franchisees, and build the operational base that a scalable food brand actually requires. The product had appeal, but the business had been racing toward expansion it was not yet ready to support in any real way.
After the cameras left
Hip Pops is still selling, having reshaped its model. The gelato pop maker pivoted away from the planned storefront and franchise approach toward a mobile truck, catering, and local delivery operation, working across Florida and into Colorado. Its site carries a current copyright footer and its Instagram shows a following in the tens of thousands with thousands of posts. The premature franchise push gave way to a leaner, working model. Medium confidence open as of 2026.
Sources
Confidence: medium. Last checked 2026-07-19.