By Amy White
The Texas Catholic
Katie Boone made the decision to begin working at Howdy Homemade Ice Cream almost four years ago for a simple reason:
“I wanted a job,” the St. Monica Catholic Church parishioner said matter-of-factly, “and there are not a lot of places that hire special needs people.”
As a person with high-functioning autism, Boone said she has experienced how, despite her strong work ethic and cheery personality, like many other people with disabilities, she faces obstacles to employment that other jobseekers might not encounter. All too often, jobs are few and far between for those who do not fit into that neurotypical mold, she said.
Howdy Homemade Ice Cream, however, is seeking to change that unfortunate reality.
Founded by Tom and Margaret Landis in 2015, Howdy is an ice cream shop built upon the mission of offering people with intellectual and developmental disabilities the opportunity to challenge themselves, to grow in their professional skills, and to create community around a shared mission — in other words, to work. With seven locations across the United States, including its original location in Dallas, Howdy has created more than 160 sustainable job opportunities for people with special needs, according to the company’s website — and has plans in place to create even more.
“I want to do something that I can’t do but God can, and that’s Howdy,” founder Tom Landis said. “We’re tapped into, I think, truly what is the future of the restaurant workforce, and it’s people like Katie and all of our employees.”
At Howdy, employees with special needs, called “heroes,” can be found making the ice cream, serving samples behind the counter, ringing up orders, tidying the space, and opening and closing shop. Since working there, Boone said she has taken on a range of these responsibilities.
“I serve the ice cream. I take the big three-gallon tubs out of the glass freezer and put them into our Dipwell. I can open and close; I have a key,” the Howdy hero said, before adding, “I love having a job!”
‘Ice cream dream team’
According to Landis, Howdy is three things: a business, a platform to share the Gospel, and, as an organization that upholds human dignity, an example of the pro-life mission truly in action. So, it made sense, he said, to partner with Undivided Life, a Catholic-led consulting company focused on human flourishing, including through dignified work.
“Our mission at Undivided Life is to impact cultural change and change the way that people see work,” said Jessie Rettinger, Undivided Life’s director of business development and a parishioner of St. Monica Catholic Church. “Work is a really good thing, and Howdy is the best example of work being a really good thing for everyone.
“It’s good for the worker; it’s good for the customer; it’s good for the guy delivering milk base for us to make ice cream,” she continued, “and so that’s the message that we want to spread.”
The leadership of Howdy and Undivided Life shook hands on a partnership over the summer of 2025 and legally solidified that collaboration, with Undivided Life as a minority owner of the Howdy enterprise, near the end of that year — a development that Landis called an “amazing blessing” and an answer to prayer.
“Collectively, what we believe is that we are the Howdy Homemade Ice Cream team, not one team or the other,” said Jeff Schiefelbein, who is co-founder of Undivided Life, CEO of Howdy, and a parishioner of St. Ann Catholic Church in Coppell. “We have the dream team — the ‘ice cream dream team,’ we called it — for growing this brand and also enjoying some delicious ice cream on the way.”
Every one of those team members is all-in on the Howdy mission, he said, and is working hard to grow the company’s impact. Right now, the team aims to expand Howdy’s shop locations, starting in DFW, so that it will be able to offer more job opportunities for adults with special needs who are seeking meaningful work. The leadership team is also working to increase catering opportunities.
“We cater at churches, schools, private parties, and corporate events,” Schiefelbein said, “and the more we cater, the more we can hire additional heroes.”
The goal of expanding Howdy, members of the leadership team said, is not just to give people with disabilities a job serving delicious ice cream; rather, the goal is ultimately to change the culture, so that the Howdy heroes can continue to grow, to explore, and to engage in dignified work anywhere they go.
“Howdy is the vehicle to create a mindset shift, or a culture shift, a fundamental shift in the belief of what people with special needs are capable of doing and how we should include and work with them and challenge them to grow with us,” Schiefelbein said. “We’d like to create the ‘Howdy way,’ the new way of thinking about employment — not just for ice cream but for all sorts of cool opportunities.”
Rettinger shared the sentiment.
“Every time a scoop of ice cream is sold, that means that a special needs adult is being supported; they are finding meaningful work; they are excelling in their career. They’re also getting set up for a future career outside of Howdy, in retail or management,” she said. “We want them to be employed everywhere in meaningful ways, so that they can use their unique God-given talents and gifts for all of society to benefit.”
All people — including people with disabilities — have something to contribute to the world, members of the Howdy team shared; and many of them also have great dreams for their futures. Boone, for example, has aspirations to work as a crime journalist someday, according to Landis.
“I don’t know what her future holds,” he said of the Howdy hero, “but this is just the start, right?”
Cutline for featured image: Katie Boone, an employee of Howdy Homemade Ice Cream, left, and Tom Landis, founder of Howdy Homemade Ice Cream, pose for a photo at the Dallas ice cream shop on March 4.
