What's an ice cream shop from Idaho doing in Fishtown?
Stella's Ice Cream, the fast-growing Idaho-based ice cream chain, opened its first East Coast location in Philly in June. It's surrounded by some steep competition.
Yet another ice cream shop has opened on the Fishtown-Kensington border — this time with brownie sandwiches, gluten-free cones, and puppy popsicles, all the way from the Potato State.
Fast-growing Idaho ice-cream chain Stella’s opened its first East Coast location at 1832 N. Front Street at the end of June.
Named for husband-and-wife founder’s Brittney and Chad Hartley’s bulldog, Stella’s opened its first location in 2018 in Nampa, ID., a Boise suburb where it gained a following for its ultra-creamy ice cream recipe, fresh baked goods, and ability to accommodate dietary restrictions. The chain grew to four locations in Idaho by 2020, and started to expand rapidly in 2023 when it began to franchise. Now, the company has 20 locations across Idaho, Arizona, Texas, Oregon, Tennessee, Indiana, Nebraska, and Utah, with more planned in the South and Midwest.
Philly franchisee Shay Marlin had no previous ties to Idaho or the food industry — save for some swing shifts at friends’ ice cream parlors or being a summer regular at Sundae Best in Avalon — when he started pursuing a Stella’s franchise in 2024. At the time, all the tech executive had was a recommendation from a friend. Stella’s, they told him, was some of the best ice cream around, with a high butter fat content that makes each scoop rich and velvety.
Two years later, Marlin looks at home behind the ice cream counter, shaping waffle cones fresh off the press and helping baker and manager Lisa Evans dust brownies with powdered sugar. All of the location’s ice cream flavors are churned on-site using Stella’s proprietary mixes, said Marlin. Its trays of fudgy brownies and slightly crisp chocolate cookies are also baked on site daily, he said, to eventually be heaped with ice cream for sundaes and sandwiches.
Business has been slow but steady, according to Marlin, with a few regulars whose dogs pull them inside daily for $2.50 “pupsicles,” the store’s pooch-friendly pops made of frozen yogurt and peanut butter on a Milk Bone.
Stella’s is located smack in the middle of the neighborhood’s ice cream corridor. The chain is surrounded by competitors: Scoop shop and listening lounge Sweet 45 a block north on Front Street; viral soft serve purveyor 1-900-ICE-CREAM seven blocks south; Weckerly’s on Girard Ave.; chains Van Leeuwen and Jeni’s Splendid Ice Cream around the corner on Frankford Avenue, not to mention one-offs like Fiore and Huda Burger that sell gourmet gelato and ice cream in tandem with sandwiches.
Why did Marlin choose to plop his shop in a saturated market?
“When we started working on the space, that one ice cream shop nearby wasn’t there,” said Marlin, referring to Sweet 45, which opened last September. “We were actually trying to get away from all the ice cream shops down the road.”
Marlin also pointed out that their ice cream-fatigued neighbors on the Fishtown-Kensington divide might want a shop closer to their apartments, or one that is decidedly unpretentious. While Stella’s offers 24 different flavors, the range is more classic than that of stores like Jeni’s and Van Leeuwen, which are currently scooping ice cream blended with goat cheese and trendy banana pudding, respectively.
“A lot of people that live a little north of here have been excited for us because they don’t have to walk all the way down [Frankford Avenue],” just for some ice cream, Marlin said. “I think there’s room for all of us.”
What makes Stella’s different?
Stella’s specialty is variety. Of the shop’s 24 flavors, eight are dairy-free and made with a coconut milk base. Specials also cycle through weekly. When an Inquirer reporter visited just after its June grand opening, a root beer flavor that tasted like a cold glass of A & W (minus the carbonation) was on rotation.
Otherwise, the shop’s ice cream offerings are riffs on parlor classics, like Rocky Road, salted caramel thick with swirls of caramel sauce, and Grasshopper, their take on mint chip that swaps chocolate for chunks of Oreo cookies. Already, Marlin said, the flavor is their bestseller. A single scoop is $6.25, with a dollar upcharge for dairy-free flavors, putting it about on par with the neighborhood’s other shops.
Also on offer: Gluten-free waffle and sugar cones — a rarity at ice cream shops — stored separately from their regular counterparts to avoid cross-contamination. There’s also novelties galore, including personal 5-inch chocolate chip cookie bowls for sundaes and hybrid brownie-cookie ice cream sandwiches. To-go pints and ice cream cakes are also available in a fridge.
Running Stella’s has been a big adjustment for Marlin, whose training consisted of a weeklong ice cream intensive in Idaho at the chain’s first location. By day, Marlin was making “gallons and gallons of ice cream” and learning things like extrusion, the process by which ice cream is shaped for things like bars or pre-made sandwiches. By night, he worked the store’s register.
Marlin called himself an “average” ice cream making-student at best, but the 10-to-12-hour days gave him a newfound appreciation for the power of the scoop.
“I don’t think people come into an ice cream shop mad at the world,” he said. “Everyone’s there to have a good time.”
Stella’s Ice Cream, 1832 N. Front St., 215-550-1032, stellasicecream.com. Hours: 12 — 10 p.m. Sunday through Thursday; 12 — 11 p.m. Friday and Saturday.
