Van Leeuwen Ice Cream is an American

ice cream parlor Ice cream parlors (American English) or ice cream parlours (British English) are places that sell ice cream, gelato, sorbet, and/or frozen yogurt to consumers. Ice cream is typically sold as regular ice cream (also called hard-packed or hard ...

chain.

History

Van Leeuwen began as a

food truck A food truck is a large motorized vehicle (such as a van) or trailer, equipped to cook, prepare, serve, and/or sell food. Some, including ice cream trucks, sell frozen or prepackaged food; others have on-board kitchens and prepare food from scrat ...

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the U ...

in 2008 between Pete Van Leeuwen, his brother Ben, and their partner Laura O'Neill. Their yellow trucks sold flavors based on imported ingredients like

Ceylon Sri Lanka (, ; si, ශ්‍රී ලංකා, Śrī Laṅkā, translit-std=ISO (); ta, இலங்கை, Ilaṅkai, translit-std=ISO ()), formerly known as Ceylon and officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, is an ...

cinnamon,

Sicilian Sicilian refers to the autonomous Italian island of Sicily. Sicilian can also refer to: * Sicilian language, a Romance language spoken on the island of Sicily, its satellite islands, and southern Calabria * Sicilians, people from or with origins ...

pistachios, and vanilla from

Papua New Guinea Papua New Guinea (abbreviated PNG; , ; tpi, Papua Niugini; ho, Papua Niu Gini), officially the Independent State of Papua New Guinea ( tpi, Independen Stet bilong Papua Niugini; ho, Independen Stet bilong Papua Niu Gini), is a country i ...

. The American private equity firm Nextworld invested $18.7 million in the company in 2020. By 2021, Van Leeuwen had opened 27 stores across the United States, including 17 in New York City. Van Leeuwen opened its 30th store in 2022 with their first locations in

Dallas Dallas () is the List of municipalities in Texas, third largest city in Texas and the largest city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the List of metropolitan statistical areas, fourth-largest metropolitan area in the United States at 7.5 ...

and

Colorado Colorado (, other variants) is a state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It encompasses most of the Southern Rocky Mountains, as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the wes ...

. In November 2022, Van Leeuwen entered a settlement agreement with the

New York City Department of Consumer and Worker Protection The New York City Department of Consumer and Worker Protection (DCWP), formerly the Department of Consumer Affairs (DCA), is an agency of the Government of New York City. History The duties were performed by the Commissioner of Public Markets un ...

. The chain agreed to comply with a New York City law that banned retail stores from refusing to accept cash as payment and to pay $33,000 in outstanding civil penalties. Van Leeuwen had been violating the law since it went into effect in November 2020 and had declined to show up for any administrative hearings.

References

External links

* 2008 establishments in New York City Ice cream brands American companies established in 2008 {{US-company-stub