For more than two decades, the South Street Creamery has been introducing sweet flavors to Morristown.
Get ready for another one: Persian ice cream.
“It’s unique,” says Reza “Ricky” Manesh, who has purchased the building and the business from the Garcia family.
The flavor–expressing hints of saffron, rosewater and pistachio–is one of the few tweaks planned by Manesh, who opened the Marjan Fine Persian Grill on Speedwell Avenue in 2010.
When he heard that his friend Ken Garcia was hoping to retire from the Creamery, Manesh remembers telling him: “You worked too hard for 22 years to bring it to where it is. It would be a shame if anybody came in and changed everything.”
Manesh says he plans to maintain the same sunny environment that has made the Creamery a morning gathering spot for young moms, a popular lunch stop, and a go-to place for kids’ birthday parties and Little League celebrations.
Eileen Mejia will continue to manage daily operations, with the same staff of high school- and college students who seemingly have grown up behind the counter.
Although this is Manesh’s first ice cream shop, he has made Persian ice cream at Marjan, the restaurant he named for his wife.
Manesh has confidence honed from decades as an entrepreneur and businessman after emigrating from Iran–where he was a professional volleyball player–following the 1979 revolution there.
He played volleyball in Canada for awhile, he says, and was a manager for a restaurant chain for several years.
With “$10 in my pocket” and a young family, the naturalized citizen then opened a small Madison shop, selling pagers by day and delivering pizzas for Domino’s until 1 a.m., he remembers.
In 1991, Manesh started a cell phone business in Madison. He would open AT&T franchises in East Hanover, Roxbury and downtown Morristown, keeping the latter one until 2009.
“I’m grateful to the United States,” says Manesh, who has two grown daughters and five grandkids. “Here, you can be who you want to be. Doors are open. Nothing will stop you if you try… If a pizza driver can make it, anybody can.”
‘A NICE, CLEAN, HAPPY SPACE’
The Garcias stuck around this month to smooth Manesh’s transition.
“We’re all so happy a wonderful new family has bought the business,” says Lori Ann Giardina, the smiling public face of the Creamery for its entire life.
Giardina’s father, Ken Garcia, cashed in many of his AT&T shares in the late ’90s to buy the building.
“He wisely said he’d like to invest in our family,” Giardina recounts. “My dad always said he wanted a family friendly restaurant, with a nice, clean, happy space, with affordable prices. That’s what we tried to do for the entire course of our time here.”
While Ken handled the shopping, Giardina’s mom, Arlene Garcia, contributed soup recipes, baked cookies and pitched in as needed.
Giardina’s brother-in-law, Peter Williams, ventured to Italy to learn how to make gelato, and to the University of Wisconsin for schooling on homemade ice cream. Giardina’s sister Carla did a stint at the Creamery, too.
Before opening in 1999, the family visited mom-and-pop ice cream shops all over the country, Giardina recounts. A store owner in Connecticut advised that each member should oversee one aspect of the business.
“Whoever is in charge of that area gets the final say. That’s why it was so successful. At the very end we were all saying what a great experience this was,” says Giardina.
She enjoyed many sweet moments–readings by children’s authors, ukulele jam sessions, visits by Santa–and some bittersweet ones, at the Creamery.
It’s where she met her husband Jeff, the love of her life. And it’s where the community rallied around them both when he bravely fought a terminal form of cancer.
Giardina looks forward to more time with her sons Justin and Christian, a high schooler who still works at the Creamery. And her parents will get a chance to retire for real.
“They would never stop going in if Peter and I were there,” Giardina says. “We needed to all retire at the same time.”
What a wonderful success story! The Creamery has been one of favorite spots in town for many years.