Siouxland Magazine - Volume 5 Issue 3
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<strong>Siouxland</strong> <strong>Magazine</strong> | Collaborating /26<br />
Carroll Street Treats<br />
Iowa’s West Coast Initiative Feature<br />
Business Owner: Reece, Liam, Ayda, Blake,<br />
Nora, and Evan Vander Zee<br />
Business Name: Carroll Street Treats<br />
Main Products/Services: Homemade Ice Cream<br />
Sandwiches<br />
Location: Rock Rapids, IA<br />
Connect: Find us on Facebook/Instagram<br />
Short description of your business:<br />
Carroll Street Treats is a 100% kid-owned business.<br />
We specialize in distributing the best homemade ice<br />
cream sandwiches in the tri-state area. We offer nine<br />
different flavor options, packing each homemade<br />
cookie combination with mounds of hand-scooped<br />
ice cream.<br />
What motivated you to start your business? What<br />
drives you each day?<br />
The vision of Carroll Street Treats started from a<br />
curbside ice cream sandwich stand in the summer of<br />
2013 when CEO, Reece Vander Zee, was eight years<br />
old. The initial motivation was to share our favorite<br />
family treat with our small-town community. What<br />
drives us daily is how God continues to use this<br />
“for-purpose” ministry to share love and connection<br />
through ice cream.<br />
What’s unique about your business?<br />
The unique thing about Carroll Street Treats is that it’s<br />
a sibling-owned business, and each sibling has a role<br />
in production, marketing, and finance.<br />
The Carroll Street Treats Crew: Joe, Meredith, Reece (17),<br />
Liam (15), Ayda (13), Blake (11), Nora (8) and Evan (4).<br />
What’s the biggest challenge you’ve had to<br />
overcome as you’ve grown your business?<br />
The biggest challenge has been staying ahead of<br />
the growth. With each passing year, each employee<br />
(sibling) has also grown in maturity and capacity, so<br />
we’ve been lucky to grow with the business, literally.<br />
What has been your greatest reward?<br />
The greatest reward has been how our success<br />
has allowed us to pay it forward to our community.<br />
The value of stewardship is essential to our vision<br />
statement. We have gotten to do some really cool<br />
things for our community.<br />
A 100% kid-owned entity that operates on a large<br />
scale is something that makes us very proud.<br />
New playground near the baseball & softball complex in<br />
Rock Rapids. One of 12 pay-it-forward projects that Carroll<br />
Street Treats has helped fund to give back.<br />
Ice Cream Sandwiches<br />
How have you benefited from the startup<br />
community in Sioux City and the region? What<br />
resources did you use?<br />
We are grateful for the exposure and experience<br />
we gained participating in The Big Challenge. Our<br />
second-place earnings helped us reach another<br />
business goal of purchasing a traveling treat trailer to
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