The Legend of the Ice Cream King The Ice Cream Depot has been making people smile for over 30 years. By Nerissa McNaughton
M
ike Rogiani is the ice cream king, and he has a golden spoon and title card framed in his office to prove it. How did he get this title? Well, it’s not just because he is the Guinness World Records™ holder for creating the world’s largest ice cream sundae; it’s more than the fact that he services areas of Alberta, North West Territories, Yukon and parts of British Columbia. It supersedes the fact that he has a depot in Calgary and headquarters in Edmonton, with a robust 31,500 square foot warehouse (with an additional 4,000 square foot freezer under construction), managed by over 30 employees. It is not the fact his warehouse has a capacity for 1,500 pallets of ice cream (which loosely translates to ice cream as far as the eye can see). What makes Mike the undisputed ice cream king is that he lives, loves, breathes and eats all things ice cream –
every day. He is the owner, general manager, ice cream scooper, marketer and face of the Ice Cream Depot; and as he’s happy to point out, it’s a very sweet job. “Back in 1980, I was in Seattle, Washington on the pier,” Mike recounts. “There were people at this ice cream shop lined up around the block waiting for a hand-made waffle cone. Intrigued, I waited in line and I got one. The warm cone, the ice cream slowly melting, the smell, the cherry on top – incredible! When I came back to Edmonton, I couldn’t get that cone out of my mind.” Eager to recreate the taste sensation and customer satisfaction he witnessed in Washington, Mike sourced two waffle irons and started selling cones at trade shows and fairs. The Ice Cream Depot | Page 1
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