Alsies Ice Cream Trucks has expanded its flavors, trucks, and offerings since introducing its sweet treats to the Harrisburg region in March.
Central Pennsylvania has former principal Scott Shapiro to thank for bringing the franchise to the area. Shapiro told PennLive previously that he missed working with the community since leaving his role in education, and the ice cream truck seemed like a good way to reconnect with it.
“I [wanted] to do something that spreads happiness and allows me and my family and our employees to really interact with the community,” Shapiro said. “I wanted to do that through an entrepreneurial endeavor.”
Shapiro’s wife, Kellie, learned about Alsies from a franchise broker in July 2024, and thus began the distribution of ice cream from the Alsies trucks. The couple’s new business venture provides frozen sweet treats to the Harrisburg, Lancaster, Mechanicsburg, and Carlisle areas.
Since then, Alsies has expanded its business by doubling its trucks and serving caffeinated beverages via brand-new coffee carts, partnering with Elementary Coffee Company in Harrisburg to provide coffee beans.
“It’s called Alsies’ Coffee Company,” Shapiro said. “We have an indoor coffee cart that’s full service. We can make cortados, espressos, lattes, and have a variety of hot chocolate bombs.”
The shop is also now offering different hot chocolate flavors, including snickerdoodle (white chocolate shell with snickerdoodle cocoa mix and mini marshmallows), chocolate peppermint (hot cocoa with freshly ground peppermint candies and marshmallows), and unicorn (white chocolate shell, hot cocoa with marshmallows, unicorn sprinkles, and unicorn chips).
Other flavors include s’mores, which are milk chocolate shells filled with graham crackers and marshmallows, cookies and cream, which are white chocolate shells with crushed Oreos and marshmallows, and, of course, a traditional hot chocolate bomb.
Shapiro and the Alsies team will also serve the new beverages on the ice cream trucks, but Shapiro hopes to get trucks specifically for the coffee in the near future, as the business continues to grow.
“We’re open year-round, and people do still want to enjoy ice cream in the colder weather,” Shapiro said. “People can now use our app to preorder ice cream to be delivered straight to their doors.”
The sweet treats are available to patrons as long as they spend a minimum of $30 and are within a 20-mile radius of the trucks. There is no delivery fee.
Along with the new drinks, patrons will also be able to enjoy new ice cream sandwiches from Nightingale Ice Cream Sandwiches, like peppermint park and pumpkin.
“Our goal is to localize and bring in community partners,” Shapiro said. “We are hoping that by expanding our winter/fall menu, we can continue to do that.”
You can catch the Alsies’ trucks from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m., daily. More information on the trucks’ locations and how to book for private events can be found here.