New traders: Scrumdiddly’s ice-cream shops

Jennifer Kane and Darren McCormack may have broken every retail rule in the book: the couple behind Scrumdiddly's ice-cream shops had never made ice cream, never owned a shop and had no business plan when they opened their first shop in Donabate in 2011.

Now they have two permanent shops – they opened one in Dún Laoghaire last year – and a pop-up shop in Arnotts on Henry Street, Dublin, that will close on Christmas Eve. They first turned a profit last year, employ four people full-time, 29 part-time and reckon they are here to stay.

The couple, who live in Rush, north Co Dublin, started the business to give Kane something to focus on as she recovered from breast cancer. She had been diagnosed at the age of 31 when she and McCormack had three children under six.

McCormack, who is now 39, had run a business making and fitting kitchens, and Kane (37) worked as personal assistant to a surgeon in Beaumont Hospital. They both had to give up work, with McCormack staying home to mind the children.

After a while, they agreed that Kane needed something to take her mind off her illness. Why an ice-cream shop? “We wanted something happy, something that would put a smile on my face,” she says. And illness had changed their attitude to taking a risk. “We decided, let’s give it a go – we’ll survive.”

Skerries shop

First she opened an ice-cream shop, Storm in a Teacup, in Skerries with McCormack’s mother, Tina. She and McCormack then opened in Donabate, taking a five-year lease on a premises that’s about equidistant from the beach and Newbridge House and Farm. “Jen just woke up one morning saying ‘scrumdiddly’ – and that’s how we got the name,” says McCormack.

At this stage they were using Kane’s illness insurance money to invest in the business and to live on. They also got some financial help from her brother, who had sold his business in Australia, and come home.

They bought ice-cream making and storing equipment and paid for supplies upfront, as they were new to the business. They buy the ice-cream mixture from a supplier in Co Cavan, sweets from many different suppliers, and make the sauces themselves.

Kane designed the business's arresting pink, blue and white signage. McCormack made the signs and outfitted the shop. They don't advertise, promoting only on social media, where they have almost 30,000 Facebook followers.

“We brainstormed around the price point,” says McCormack. “We wanted a family of four to be able to get ice creams for €10 or less.”

Their most popular product is a large “Scrummy tub”, which sells for €2.50. They sell ice cream with a choice of three out of 30 toppings of sweets, and eight sauces.

Dún Laoghaire

They made a profit last year, the year they decided to open in Dún Laoghaire. They leased a shop on a stretch of the coast road where there are no other retail outlets, quite a long way from the centre of the town.

They broke the rules again. “We genuinely had never heard of Teddy’s ice cream shop, being from north Dublin.” (Teddy’s ice-cream shop on the seafront at Sandycove is a bit of a southside institution, which other ice-cream vendors might have feared to take on.) They chose the shop on the corner of Crofton Road and Kelly’s Avenue because “we saw an ad in the window saying it was for rent – and Jen loved the building”. They found the rent not much different to what they pay in Donabate and the rates not that expensive. The couple found the town’s BID (Business Improvement District) company, formed to attract investment to the town, very helpful.

Business took off, and there are queues outside the Dún Laoghaire shop now, families by day and carloads of college students in the evening. This year, Scrumdiddly's was shortlisted as one of the best newcomers in The Irish Times's Best Shops in Ireland competition.

Arnotts approached them recently, asking them to open Scrumdiddly’s in the front of the Henry Street shop as part of Arnotts’ “Christmas experience”. They pay Arnotts a percentage of their takings. Already people are asking if they would open full-time in the city centre – and they’re seriously considering it.