July '08 Scoop

R & R
We hope this letter finds you well.
In late June, Ryan and Eric traveled to The Ice Screamers, a collector group in Lancaster County that is interested in the history of ice cream and soda fountains. This is an annual personal vacation to chat with other passionate members from all over the world about ice cream objects. We supplied 3 old-fashioned ice cream flavors served up with accompanying stories, histories and regional interest. We also found a wonderful place to stay in downtown Lancaster, a 19th century tobacco barn converted to a boutique hotel (Lancaster Arts) that was a perfect stepping off ground for some exploring. And treasures abounded! Within a few brick blocks, we found Demuth’s Tobacco Shop, the OLDEST TOBACCO SHOP IN THE COUNTRY! since 1770, remodeled in mahogany in 1917. After a pouch of pipe mixture and a fistful of Pennsylvania leaf-wrapped stogies, we emerged in a cloud of hazy euphoria. Incidentally, if one visits Demuths, be sure to check out the home and studio of Charles Demuth next door, the Precisionist painter whose factory smokestack paintings of the 30s surely must have been influenced by his tobacconist background. And if you can’t make it to Lancaster, one can visit his work at the Museum of Modern Art and the Metropolitan in New York City.

Early the next morning, we awoke to visit Lancaster’s legendary Central Farmer’s Market for breakfast baked goods and local produce. For two bachelors, any chance to buy groceries is rare and valuable, and shop we did. Eric was wooed by mouth-watering green stalks being pruned by an elderly woman at Hodecker’s Celery stand while Ryan romanced a pint of organic black raspberries, freshly picked by farmer Tom, a young Mennonite man who has an enterprising gift of gab. At $7 a pint, he was sold and 12 hours later served them at a Rittenhouse Square dinner party, over Franklin ice cream and fudge, of course…

Progress
We hope this letter finds you well. Ryan and Eric have been learning many valuable lessons, from proper delegation and fine-tuning recipes to the systematic care of all aspects of daily store operations like the streamlining simple things such as spoon placement and fudge warmer rotations. As our mind wraps around the idea that we are actually in the restaurant business in the year 2008 and not 1908, we have about 100 years of catch up work. This looks very different from the outside as it does from the inside. While last summer, Ryan and Eric were almost completely tuckered out from 7-day-a-week operations, we’ve realized that it is best to serve our customers by working smarter in our 4th Floor Office, keeping ourselves slimmer & trimmer from the long flight up. We’ve invested into many grassroots efforts and have seen happy returns from those. In their proper place, The Grateful Dead station has been found on our radio for us to connect with the actual chaos most restaurants experience in the 21st Century (see The China Cat Sunflower @ right). It is hard for customers to imagine this world. For us, it has become a performance art. We’ve found this our natural method of meeting customers one cone at a time. While we grapple with compassion for the local homeless population which seem to lap up our cream from trash cans the city is disregarding, we can only feel helpless to solve problems beyond our control, but by meeting them one human being at a time.

With the assistance of our accountant, we have tackled and learned Quickbooks, a program of vital necessity for any small time business like ours. Our accounting system at best had been up until this point a cigar box method of cash accounting and money drops at our local bank up the street paying every bill immediately in cash or check. Quickbooks, however, is best found by losing oneself in the slowness of the past, namely thinking at 1908 speed to absorb as much information as we can along the way. While we’re puttering along in a hand-cranked Model T, most businesses operate in gas guzzling turbo-charged Hummers along The Indianapolis Speedway. The Art Deco mantra of speed has been implemented in our most critical areas. More light gives us a chance to see what we’re doing. Not only have we multiplied positions (summer driver, prep crew, 3 ice cream makers and 3 designated managers), we have also multiplied systems for keeping all of this well-cared for and managed, properly-ensuring the quality and consistency of customer experience at every level. While we have certainly sped along, we have so much further to comprehend as we live paradoxically into the 21st Century.


Around The Town
In addition to giving an ice cream demonstration at Foster’s Urban Homeware on Saturday June 28th, the Fountain was featured in a variety of Philadelphia news channels in the month of June and July. Two online press pieces of note: streetalkin.com and Channel 3’s feature on the shop, which will air online again this weekend Finally, CNN 8 featured the brothers cranking homemade blueberry ice cream early in the morning of July 9th live in their studios at the PSFS building.

Just this Monday, the demolition crew arrived early to start dismantling our neighbor’s building at 112 Market Street. Ryan jumped at the chance to salvage the Victorian tin ceiling and he and Patrick expended great energies over the next few days taking it apart, panel by panel. The building, only half remaining of a 19th century brick structure, once housed Feitig & Son Meats in 1918, and a massage parlor later in the century as evidenced by the cedar-paneled sauna that was torn out. If the real estate market holds its stomach, a 5-story condominium building will rise from the dust.


Nothing’s New That’s Not Old
We’re belting out the 7th Inning Stretch Sundae in ode to the popular 1908 song “Take Me Out to the Ballgame.” FOX News will be featuring the Berley brothers serving up this sundae on their morning show Monday July 14th at 8:50am in anticipation of their station's All Star Game coverage.

We have also called up from the dug out: fresh locally sourced Blueberry and Black Raspberry ice creams for July.

Eric is moving into one of the apartments above the Fountain, with a whole new outlook on personal materialism. He’s literally lived out of milk crates and an aesthetic performance lifestyle for 4 hectic years and is looking forward to a shorter commute!

Spring '08 Scoop

Peace & Management
We are very excited as we embark on the experience of having hired managers that will enable the Brothers to manage the good work always going on at The Fountain, the Ice Cream Department and in the Office. We continue to try to take life slowly and methodically, emphasizing the details along the way.

Progress
Our new walk-in freezer has just been installed this week into our cellar, making life a lot easier to find our reserves for the weekend crush. Two men from Bally, Berks County, installed the locally made unit shown in the photograph. In addition, we have new sturdy rubbish receptacles, and more antique tables to our growing outdoor seating. With the arrival of Spring, we’ve potted more flowers and plants outside and in to freshen up the Fountain experience.

Sweet Acts
Our House-made Franklin Ice Cream Department has tried and succeeded with our Honey Rose ice cream, our fresh Blood Orange sherbet, and refreshing Lemon sorbet.
In honor of the Walnut Street Theater’s production of Les Miserables, try our French Vanilla ice cream with blueberry ribbons and a field of raspberries. “Crème de Lafayette” will be a patriotic flavor served all summer long marking the friendship of Franklin to France and her great general.

At the Arden Theater, we offered peanut butter bone doggy treats atop ice cream for their GO DOG GO children’s premier. Starting May 22nd, the "Our Town" production celebrating the Arden’s 20th anniversary. Air-Conditioning circa 1908! Beautifully designed vintage Franklin Ice Cream advertising hand fans are free with tickets and sold on our counters for $2. These will be collector’s items shortly!

Dry Goods Department
New Gift Certificates are in and looking beautiful. Remember you can get one in any denomination over $5. Starting in June, Fountain staff will be adding house-made Caramel sauce and dessert Peanut Butter in jars for take-home, next to our very popular Hot Fudge!

Unleash a “Burmese Tiger.”
This sundae introduced in early 1908 was made most meaningful as a concoction of peace and we’re now using its profits towards sending aid to victims of the recent cyclone thru Doctors Without Borders in Myanmar, formerly known as Burma. Please come and try our ginger and cherry vanilla ice creams striped with orange marmalade and dark chocolate syrups for a real ROAR.

Hot off the Presses:
The Franklin Fountain made the front cover of Frozen Dessert Magazine with a great article and lots of color photographs. See the article @ www.frozendessertmagazine.com
An article in gourmand magazine SAVEUR featured the Fountain as one of the top ice cream spots in the North, with Jenkins, Max and Ryan were photographed eating their favorite flavors.
Brother Eric was photographed en-large for the summer issues of WHERE magazine, serving up a float of Franklin Fountain fun for thousands of tourists.

…and for a Photographic Finale:
Photographer Andy Pinkham proposed an ‘occupational’ sitting to the Berley brothers one quiet evening in Fairmount Park. On the grounds of the Centennial Exposition, Eric and Ryan displayed the tools of their trade and confectionery wares while the golden sunlit descended into the golden envelope of night. The image is tinted and will be printed and framed to greet patrons of The Franklin Fountain for years to come. See Andy’s website for this and other fantastical works www.andrewpinkham.com

March '08 Scoop

NOW OPEN SEVEN DAYS for SPRING!

Well, it doesn’t feel like spring quite yet but it will, and soon I can assure you. Slowly awaking from the doldrums of winter, we experienced some fortunate and some no-so-fortunate circumstances during the month of March. First, the good news…

Our relationship with the University of Pennsylvania continues strong as senior Eric Karlan (’08) wrote a beautiful piece on The Franklin Fountain for the 34th Street Magazine. Eric, a brother at Sigma Alpha Mu fraternity, learned about our shop while on a freshman pledge scavenger hunt and has been a loyal ice cream eater ever since. His story graced the cover of the magazine, which was inserted into Penn’s weekly newspaper The Daily Pennsylvanian, which just so happened to feature a huge photograph on the cover of Eric serving a Root Beer float at the Sophomore Skimmer earlier that week. That’s what you call a double scoop! No doubt many Penn men will be bringing their lady friends down to The Fountain for a “college ice”* when the weather warms up.

Also, on the sunny side, the new {old} Root Beer keg is plumbed in! We’re serving our own concoction of herbs, barks, sugars and other stuff on draught and calling it “Poor Richard’s Root Beer.” For those who don’t know the story, Charles E. Hires invented root beer in this very neighborhood of Philadelphia in the 1870s. Wikipedia has a good version of the story if you search Hires.
And, of course, Franklin’s original shop where Poor Richard’s was printed was located directly across the street from The Fountain {see plaque where the El station is currently}. Voila! Look for an article on root beer in STYLE magazine later this spring.

One Friday night, brother Eric was moving the large metal case full of candy molds in the basement. Unexpectedly, the weight shifted and in a split second he was pinned underneath of 1,000 lbs of 19th century cast iron confectionery molds. Luckily, the way it fell, his knees took the blow and he was able to reach for his cellular phone to call the shop. Jeff and Ryan bounded down the stairs to the rescue, relieving the pressure until the ambulance arrived. Over at the Jefferson trauma ward, Eric was walking within an hour and we all breathed a sigh of relief. He escaped with a good-looking scar and a story. Now when customers ask why we decided not to make clear toys for Easter this year, we tell them “the pressure was too great.”

On a personal note, our 26 year-old cousin Seth tragically passed away last summer. Seth was working for the American Red Cross and his family has organized a blood drive in his honor. The Berley family will be traveling to Wilmington, North Carolina in a few weeks to help out with the drive and give blood in his hometown. Anyone interested in participating can give blood at any Red Cross sponsored site in your locale during April. Email SethMattsonBloodDrive@yahoo.com afterwards and your donation will be credited in Seth’s honor.

If you visit the Fountain and you don’t see Ryan or Eric working the counter, it’s because we’re feverishly working backstage preparing for the busiest season yet! We’ve hired and are training three new staff members: Max, Jenkins and Ashley, who bring film, song and instrumental talents to the stage along with stellar soda-jerking stuff. In the ice cream room, Eric has hired Lawrence, a man of deep intelligence, world experience and a critical palate to help out making the ice cream this year. We’re also improving our equipment, including a new blast freezer and a walk-in {more like crawl-into our 19th century cellar} freezer to handle larger capacities. We're also continuing to improve our product sourcing & offerings for an even better customer experience.

Coming in April…

Jeff’s ideal for Spring:
“Le Paix” which is a peaceful medley of our new Honey-Rose Ice Cream floated in a Violet-Lavender-Berry soda, garnished with sweet, whipped cream and a quartered strawberry.

Old-fashioned paper straws made by the same company since 1888!

If you would like to be removed from our letter list, please email info@franklinfountain.com to do so.

Winter '08 Scoop!

Philadelphia, February 1908

Warm winter wishes from The Franklin Fountain! Buckled down here in mid-February, we’ve got a lot to report in the past two months in life and business. New Years arrived without celebration, except for those customers who realized the Fountain is now open on weekends (Friday, Saturday and Sunday) in the Winter. We will return to a 7-day schedule sometime in March… Early in the New Year, the world lost a great man in Dick Warren (1935-2008). Dick was a mentor of ours in the ice cream business, a fellow collector of ice cream ephemera and a role model in life. Please see the eulogy [right].

By month’s end, we prepared the store to run under the capable hands of the crew and embarked for ten days on our annual Old Time Soda Fountain and Confectionery tour. First stop was the Pennsylvania State Capitol in Harrisburg where the boys tread the early 1900s Moravian Tile Floors in search of local scenes. There we saw the Letitia St. House, a milkmaid and two spectacular and spectacled Franklin mosaics. Then onto the Midwest! went the cry, taking aim at Zaharako’s in Columbus, Indiana. In the last two years, this gloriouis soda fountain from 1899 was rescued by a local businessman, Tony Morbeck, and is being restored to the hilt. Ryan and Eric visited to see the progress in all of its deconstructed glory. Quarter-sawn oak paneling was being refinished, tin ceilings patched, gaslights re-gilded and stained glass cleaned. A very capable crew was onsite the day we visited, meticulously working towards a 2009 re-opening. We are truly inspired by the attention to detail and resources Tony has allocated for Zaharako’s and look forward to assisting with its restoration. Gentleman Morbeck truly deserves a “huzzah” for his efforts!

Next was the sparkling Schimpff’s Confectionery in Jeffersonville, Indiana where, since 1871, the Schimpff family has been making beautiful candies. Warren and Jill Schimpff graciously gave their full attention all afternoon to us, touring us around their soda fountain and candy museum … an absolute visual cacophony of confectionery. Ryan and Eric were overwhelmed by their stunning collection of candy advertising and antique hard candy machines, many of which still in are in service. There is a candy-making demonstration area that was drawing passersby from the street the week before Valentine’s Day, blazing with red hot hearts. We traded secrets on Clear Toy molding, sniffed the back room chocolate operations and sympathized with the daily trials of a labor-intensive high volume business. These folks have passion and it shows…keep it up!

Many other stops peppered our trip including another stop at Tom’s Ice Cream Bowl (Zanesville, OH), the only ice cream shop the Berley Brothers salivate over as hot roasted cashews and redskin peanuts emerge from the ovens to coat scrumptious sundaes. Antique shopping in Ohio yielded a van full of old wire ice cream tables for use at the Fountain (we don’t buy new ones) and a hard candy batch roller to continue our journey into the world of the sugar arts. Zingerman’s Deli and Bakery in Ann Arbor, Michigan was a must-see as they literally wrote the book on customer service that Eric had devoured this past year. We were very well received by founder Ari and the other owners of this local institution and were encouraged by their focused, organic approach to growth over the past 25 years. Check out www.zingermans.com to learn more about this amazing company! Rounding the trip out was the usual mix of art and architecture via the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn and the Detriot Institute of the Arts reminded us that so many great things begin and end with artists.

Back in the City of Brotherly Love, we are working towards exciting internal improvements at The Fountain. A new, old-style water fountain was just plumbed in on the Letitia St sidewalk to service the throngs of thirsty ice cream eaters in the summer. Made by Murdock of Ohio since 1853, it is an original design from the early 1900s and a refreshing example of American craftsmanship in bronze and iron. A vintage Hires Root Beer barrel from the 1930s will shortly dispense our home-made root beer recipe in tall chilled mugs, “on draught “ as it were. New systems, sundaes and soda clerks will signal the start of spring…stay tuned!

If you would like to be removed from our letter list, please email info@franklinfountain.com to do so.