King Kone Has Soft Re-Opening as Worker Co-Op
PITTSFIELD, Mass. — Ice cream is again being swirled into cones and cups at a long-beloved city spot.
King Kone had a soft opening at the end of the week, offering the frozen treats on a "pay what you will" basis while employees perfected the craft.
"It's gone pretty good," employee Patrick Doyle said.
"It gets really fast-paced even with a few customers and the learning curve is steeper than I thought but other than that it's been fun so far and I really am doing this because I believe in you know the cooperative ownership, working class struggle."
He has a full-time job but made time in his schedule to be a part of this.
Nonprofit Roots & Dreams and Mustard Seeds purchased the property and the shop will run as a workers' co-op. Everyone is paid a flat wage, sharing revenues, and will have the opportunity to buy into the business.
"It's about transparent decision making, cooperative negotiation for decisions, conflicts," co-founder Michael Hitchcock said.
"Skills about how to think like an owner instead of an employee, like taking responsibility for the whole operation and understanding that any action you do commits everyone else's time and resources so you have to be cognizant of the others. Those are the kinds of skills we'll be working on in our monthly meetings. That's our next big hurdle."
In 2023, the nonprofit was allocated $179,000 to purchase the soft-serve ice cream shop at 133 Fenn St. and convert it into a worker cooperative. It owns a series of storefronts ranging from 117 to 129 Fenn St.
Roots & Dreams and Mustard Seeds will also expand its current arts programming through the creation of a community art gallery and exhibition space in the adjacent retail space in the same building. There will be $17 per day space rentals for people who want to paint or make crafts and monthly gallery shows will be held.
The Barbarotta family closed the shop's order and pickup windows for the last time at the end of the 2023 season as they prepared to sell.
Hitchcock said a formal grand opening may happen next week.
"We own the other half of this building where we run our food pantry, totally free food and clothes for anybody, bilingual service, no means testing. Anyone can come," he said.
"While we were filling out a grant with the state to improve a space over there, I kept seeing the word 'building acquisition,' and this person had been joking about selling it to me for a long time but then he put it actually on the market. So that was the biggest hurdle."
A fundraiser with merchandise was launched to support costs associated with the reopening, including T-shirts and sweat shirts with a gorilla holding an ice cream cone and "King Cone" in blue letters. The design was created by an artist co-op member.
About $2,500 was spent on supplies so far and the shop isn't fully stocked.
"This place will be totally independent of our nonprofit and this place will pay the nonprofit rent," Hitchcock explained. "Our nonprofit does not own this business. We are buying this business from the nonprofit."
The group is discussing what to do with excess revenue beyond wages and direct costs of business. He feels good about the training so far, as employees have already been pitching in ideas for improvements, and "they're already thinking about long term."
Tags: ice cream, nonprofits,
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