Six Strawberries Hints at a Brick-And-Mortar Location

Six Strawberries is hot in the middle of its third summer serving blueberry lemonade and Caffe Vita latte ice pops at farmers markets, catered gigs, and on-site events, producing 1,250 pops for an Amazon conference last week. Ice pop purveyors and partners-in-crime Vanessa Resler and Will Lemke tell Eater they're planning to finish up their busy summer season, then jump into planning for a brick-and-mortar home north of the Ship Canal.

Six Strawberries was established in 2012 and caught media attention when an early fan named Macklemore ordered pops for 600 fans before a free surprise set at Neumos.

Business has been growing since that first summer. "Things ramped up a lot more and faster than we were expecting this year," Resler says, with June and July "a whirlwind of making popsicles" with the help of a new commercial-grade machine that's doubled the couple's production rate as sales have increased.

The Six Strawberries crew has been using a commercial kitchen owned by the Ballard Elks to peel and pit fruit (a new hire recently pitted 120 lbs of cherries in a shift) and freeze pops. Days when fruit comes in can be especially long: Resler pulled a 17 hour shift yesterday, when a huge batch of ripe peaches arrived in the kitchen from a local farm.

Ready to move into their own kitchen and launch a business that will operate year-round, Resler says, "We have both put our foot down. June 1 of next year we're opening a brick-and-mortar," in either Ballard or Fremont.

The couple is beginning to secure funding and dream up the menu, which could include floats and, if the cost of a liquor license is within reach, boozy pops. But offerings will decidedly stay in the ice pop realm. "We're not interested in entering ice cream world," Resler says.
· Six Strawberries [Official Site]
· Six Strawberries [Facebook]
[Photo: Six Strawberries/Facebook]