Neighborhood Ice Cream Store Looks Forward to Warmer Weather

Even though his store is open year-round, Portage Trail Dairy Queen Owner Bill Marble gears up for the summer season.

In about a week, his college-age employees will be finished with exams and reporting for duty along with the five or six new faces Marble has hired for his busiest time of the year.

Food sales stay pretty constant from month to month, but when warm weather finally hits, Marble’s customers want ice cream -- lots of ice cream. In fact, Marble says 40-50 percent of his annual sales will be rung up from May through August.

Like the rest of us, Marble is eagerly waiting for warm weather. “People don’t want ice cream in the winter.”

The Portage Trail Dairy Queen is a neighborhood store, Marble said. In summer, the parking lot is littered with bikes of the neighborhood kids and evening sales are driven by families who walk to the store on hot summer nights, he said.

“We know a lot of them by name,” he said. In some cases, employees know what the regular customers want before they order, he added.

The biggest seller is no surprise – Blizzards. Marble said Blizzards are not only the best-selling item in his store, but also company-wide. Favorite flavors are Oreo and Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup.

A growth area for his store and for the company is cakes. Marble said his wife and daughter prepare all the ice cream cakes for his store, sandwiching fudge and crunch between two layers of Dairy Queen soft serve ice cream. He also employs four cake decorators to handle special order and to keep the nine-door freezer full. You can choose from already made cakes, order in-store or order cakes online. May and June, with Mother’s Day and graduations, will be busy cake months, Marble said.

The Akron-Canton-Cleveland market developed the company’s cake program in the early 1980s, he said.

Marble, who has owned his Dairy Queen franchise store since 1980, also has spruced up the store for summer. He recently completed an interior remodel and has improved the parking lot and drive-through.

Marble’s Dairy Queen is located at 715 Portage Trail in Cuyahoga Falls. The store can be reached by calling 330-928-0246.

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