TURNERS FALLS — The locally popular soft-serve ice cream shop, the Country Creemee, has found a new home.
If all goes as planned, the Millers Falls Road shop will continue serving ice cream on warm summer nights, but in a downtown location. Business owners plan to sign a new lease for a storefront on Avenue A and are shooting to open the first week of April.
“I think we are going to do well there. I really do,” said business owner Cynthia Ahearn, who plans to sign the final paperwork on Friday night.
The search to find a new location started last week when business owners were devastated to learn that they had received 30 days notice to vacate the property that had housed the Country Creemee for 23 years.
The property owner, the adjacent manufacturer Hillside Plastics, announced that it is expanding operations and will use the property on Millers Falls Road for extra parking. The factory, best known locally for its maple syrup containers, was approved for a major expansion, adding 30,000 square feet to its Millers Falls Road headquarters, said company President Peter Haas.
While nothing is set in stone yet, the Creemee business owners are already envisioning their future. The new location is planned to have a small indoor seating area and picnic tables outside in a grassy area near the Discovery Center. While the tradition at the old location of sitting out in the sun, watching the planes pass overhead from the nearby airport may be over, the owners are looking forward to establishing new traditions.
The new location is near Unity Park. Customers could order a grinder before going to a ball game and then stopping back into the Creemee for a sweet snack after the game, said Ahearn.
Business owners are confident that their customers who would drop by for hot dogs and homemade baked beans will follow them to the new location.
Their next step is moving all the heavy equipment. Members of the Mohawk Ramblers motorcycle club plan to donate their time to help move the Creemee to its new spot at 52 Avenue A, formally an ice cream establishment called Twisters that has since closed.
“I think it’s going to work out really well for us,” Ahearn. “I think it’s going to work out even better.”
You can reach Lisa Spear at:
lspear@recorder.com
or 413-772-0261, ext. 280