Today we’d like to introduce you to Glaciers Italian Ice.
Glaciers Italian Ice Youth Entrepreneurship Program was founded to keep our youth and young adults safe, educated, and employed. As a direct alternative to the “Water Boyz,” we have strategized, organized, and mobilized a viable solution.
Since 2020, there were over 1000 calls made relevant to youth selling water on the street. There were also over 400 complaints relating to things such as aggressive sale tactics, obstructing traffic, and unwillingness to clean the area when complete. There have been 32 arrests made, 18 shootings, and unfortunately the murder of an 18-year-old male, Mr. Jalanni Press who was killed in Midtown over a $10 water bottle dispute. Glaciers Italian Ice seeks to rectify this problem by providing our young men with an opportunity to become financially independent and safe.
Our product, Italian Ice, is better than ice cream, shaved ice, and sherbet. It is a cold, low-fat, vegan-friendly treat made with real fruit. Similar to sorbet, it’s soft, sweet, and delicious. We manufacture and prepackage our own ice, serving over 14 different flavors, four different sizes, pricing them at $1 Kids, $3 Smalls, $5 Mediums, and $7 Larges with our bestselling flavors being Tropical Rainbow, Passionfruit, and Mango.
Similar to Chick Fil A, Glaciers Italian Ice implores an owner-operator model in which we provide a turnkey business for our youth. Glacier provides the infrastructure, marketing materials, location, permits, equipment, and training to operate a successful Italian ice cart. By splitting the profit, we incentive and motivate our youth to work.
Through our screening process, youth will undergo an intensive mentoring program where they will learn the Glaciers Italian Ice key principles: Hard Work, Humility, Honesty, and Hospitality. We wish for our youth to grow with our company as they will master budgeting, communication, and time management skills. We have recently hired three young men and operate two push carts and a storefront located at 2185 Martin Luther King Jr. Dr. SW Atlanta GA 30310.
At our storefront location, we host a variety of daily programmings such as Chess, Yoga, Art, Gardening, Forums and academic tutoring. We hope to reshape after-school and summer camp programming. On a weekend you may find us a Westside and Grant Park. Most recently, Glaciers Italian Ice won the 2021 Urban League of Greater Atlanta Small Business Start-Up Accelerator Pitch Contest and a recipient of Fulton County’s Youth Summer Program initiative.
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
Creating this nonprofit program has brought a wide range of challenges. At first, we solely wished to operate our push-carts but upon our research, the City of Atlanta required us to have a “base of operation” to secure a business license and health permit. This requirement added an enormous amount of unwanted overhead to our operation.
Even though it is certainly a burden to cover the cost, we find peace in knowing we are properly permitted and licensed as well as operating in a space that allows us to grow, improve our community and operate our after-school and summer program.
The City of Atlanta also has a public vending permit lottery system that stops taking applications after March. This made it extremely difficult to operate but through the use of private vending permits, we have made it work via our community partners.
Our push carts also do not have hand sinks which forced us to start to prepackage our ice instead of scooping to serve. This necessary change worked out well as our prepackage system is better for teaching business practices to our young men such as inventory tracking and makes for easier accounting.
No matter the obstacle we have persevered and we are excited to work with our local leaders to lessen these restrictions and truly provide equitable economics for the youth which we serve. Equitable economics means we are afforded opportunities to work without high operating costs, vending fees, and lengthy applications. We wish to operate in high-traffic locations that yield the highest amount of income. Places such as Hartsfield -Jackson International Airport, Mercedes Benz Stadium, State Farm, Truist Park, Piedmont Park, and the Atlanta Beltline are some places we would love to provide our services. We wish to be able to vend anywhere our idols “King of Pops” can.
As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
Glaciers Ice employs young black men and teaches them the skillset they need to operate their own business. We are unique in that we operate an LLC and 501c3 organization that employs and educates our youth. Our storefront location at 2185 Martin Luther King Jr. Dr. is a safe haven to many in the area. We are changing the way equitable economics looks in Atlanta with the hope of expanding nationwide. When there are issues in our community, we create solutions. We are not seeking to make a profit but to empower a generation. We are extremely proud of the youth we interact with every day and the community’s support of us thus far.
If we knew you growing up, how would we have described you?
Our Executive Director Ian Elmore – Moore is originally from Newark, New Jersey, Ian has been committed to serving others. At the age of 21, Ian co-founded the nonprofit organization entitled The Noble Truth Project, a Saturday diversion program for adjudicated adolescents.
Through his leadership, the non-profit organization assisted hundreds of youth within the metro-Atlanta area, bolstering a 17% recidivism rate. This success led Ian to become Atlanta-Fulton County’s Gang Prevention Coordinator, the first within the state of Georgia. Ian has had several years of classroom experience as a certified middle grades social studies teacher, where he became a two-time district nominee for Teacher of the Year. Ian gained licensure from John Maxwell’s “Empowered Living Team” which facilitates Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion training for non-profit and profit organizations.
Ian is also a registered yoga teacher, instructing trauma-informed youth within Georgia’s Department of Juvenile Justice facilities, and is also a trained DISC facilitator under the Eric Thomas “Extreme Execution” program. Ian currently serves at the King Center as the Director of the Beloved Leadership Academy, a premiere youth program. The program focuses on leadership and character development, entrepreneurship, and 21st-century innovation. The BCLA is committed to developing the next generation of compassionate, courageous, and conscientious leaders who think critically to solve pressing world issues.
Ian earned his diploma from the prestigious Morristown Beard School, his Bachelor of Arts degree in Philosophy from Morehouse College, his Master’s degree in Educational Leadership from Kennesaw State University and is a current EdD candidate at Fairleigh Dickenson University.
Ian is an educator, author, corporate facilitator, keynote speaker, yoga instructor, and life coach dedicated to assisting others in realizing their potential.
Pricing:
- Kids $1 and Smalls $3
- Mediums $5 and Larges $7
- Prepackaged Cups $3 and $5
Contact Info:
- Website: www.glaciersice.org
- Instagram: instagram.com/glaciersiceatl
- Facebook: facebook.com/glaciersitalianice
- Other: tiktok.com/glaciersiceatl
