Headquartered in Des Moines, it was founded in June 1930 during the Great Depression by Iver Erickson and Bill Anderson.

[4][1][5] Starting in 1930, AE offered early-morning home delivery of milk, in glass bottles.

For the first two decades home deliveries were made seven days a week, because many customers did not own refrigerators.

[6] This began in September 1984, following the disappearance of two Iowa paperboys, Johnny Gosch and Eugene Martin.

[8] In 2020, the AE dairy received a multimillion-dollar loan under the provisions of the CARES Act economic stimulus bill.