Arctic Ice Cream’s lunch counter opened in 1931, during the Great Depression. It survived the depression, World War II and every other economic upheaval of the century only to succumb to the bad economy in January of this year.
Tom Green, owner of Arctic Ice Cream, said it was no longer economical to keep four employees running the lunch counter, which served mostly cheap breakfast food.
“We just didn’t have enough business,” Green said. “We just slowly lost business. You can only charge so much for eggs and sandwiches. It’s not like you can make a lot of money doing it unless you have a lot of volume.”
Green, a Yardley resident, said new eateries, especially the Ewing Diner, had taken away a lot of business. And the place got a lot more foot traffic when car dealerships lined Arctic Parkway, which was named after the ice cream factory. Now there is a government office and a shopping center.
The space once used for the diner is being converted to sell what Arctic specializes in — ice cream.
The closure of the diner is not the first change the company has weathered through the years. Arctic was founded on Hermitage Avenue in Trenton in 1931 by Green’s grandfather, George Schultz. Sometime in the mid-1940s, Green isn’t sure exactly when, the factory moved to Ewing, and a Quonset-hut-like structure was built to house it. Some of the equipment they put there, like the compressors, is still in use today. The “newer” gear dates back to the ’60s, and when running at full speed, can pump out three gallons of ice cream every 50 seconds.
Green formulates and tests the ice cream himself, and Arctic changes its lineup of flavors throughout the year. Around Easter, they make coconut fudge. Summer time means ice cream made with fresh blueberries. Peppermint Ice Cream is made around Christmas, and they make pumpkin-flavored ice cream in the fall.
“I do eat a lot of ice cream,” Green said.
The way the ice cream is made has not changed at all since the company was founded, he said. Though the company employs nine people at peak production time in the summer, Green does much of the work himself, from fixing the equipment to peeling bananas for the banana ice cream.
Arctic also sells ice and dry ice.
Green has memorabilia from the old days, when the place was known as “The Hut” and hosted dances and musical acts like “Freddie the Fiddler” in addition to making ice cream.
Now, Arctic is something of an odd duck in the ice cream world. It’s not a major distributor like Turkey Hill, nor is it a one-store gourmet boutique. Instead, it is a medium-sized distributor, doing about $1 million in sales every year. Green said they sell ice cream to local ice cream trucks, shore stands, retailers and restaurants, all within about 100 miles. Its peanut butter ice cream is locally famous, though vanilla is by far the most popular flavor.
Green said there are very few companies left the size of Arctic. “It’s tough trying to stay in business against Jack and Jill and Turkey Hill,” he said. “It’s like the local hardware store trying to compete with Home Depot.”
Green said that despite the loss of the lunch counter, he expects Arctic will still be around for quite some time.
“We’re definitely staying in business,” he said.
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