On Sunday afternoon, fittingly on National Ice Cream Day, a large crowd gathered outside San Francisco’s venerable Mitchell’s Ice Cream shop, as Linda Mitchell and her brother Brian Mitchell ripped down a black plastic tarp revealing an elaborate ice cream-themed mural to celebrate the business’s 70th anniversary.
The enthusiastic occasion, which included rollback 70 cent scoop prices, seemed even more precious against the death march of business closures in the city, including the pending demise of the city’s 127-year old Anchor Steam Brewery.
“I think it’s one of the few that’s still under the same family ownership,” Linda Mitchell said of the family ice cream business started in 1953 by her father Larry Mitchell and uncle Jack Mitchell. “So I do feel like that’s very special for us.”
The shop in San Francisco’s outer-Mission neighborhood has hosted generations of ice cream lovers, who fill themselves on cones stuffed with exotic ice cream flavors like mango, purple yam and lychee. When the Mitchell brothers opened the shop, they offered 17 standard flavors but expanded to forty flavors in the sixties after partnering with a fruit importer from the Philippines, which the family still uses.
“We’ve never rested on our laurels,” said Linda Mitchell. “We’ve always felt like we could improve and have always tried to improve over the years.”
The crowd gathered for the anniversary braved a two-hour line to enter the temple of ice cream and walk away with a treasured cone. People walked out of the shop licking ice cream cones as if they’d just won the lottery.
“I moved to the East Bay, I used to live right up the block right here,” said Fred Rustrian as he stood in line. “I make that travel down here just to get this ice cream.”
Linda Mitchell’s grandmother bought the building in the early 1900s, the ground floor housed a vacant liquor store when Larry and Jack hatched their plan to transform it into an ice cream shop. Larry, a San Francisco fireman, and Jack, a plumber did the work themselves to ready the building for its new future. A cream salesman instructed the brothers on how to make ice cream. On June 6th, 1953 - Mitchell’s was born.
Aside from the imported fruit, the secret ingredient behind the shop’s longevity seemed to be family. Linda segued from a career as a bank auditor to working in the family business 32 years ago. Her brother Brian started working in the shop four decades back. The store’s husband and wife managers, who’ve each worked three decades at Mitchell’s, met there.
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“This is where I found my family,” said Wanda Payumo, who along with her husband Marlon Payumo runs the day-to-day operations.
“Seventy years, they know Mitchell’s serving the same ice cream from day one,” added Marlon.
The shop has survived changing tastes, increased competition, and the pandemic which shut the doors for three months, before workers returned to serve ice cream from the front door. The din of nearby traffic and the plexiglass shield made it difficult to take orders.
“That was a nightmare,” said Linda shaking her head at the memory. Mitchell’s ice cream wholesale to grocery stores and restaurants sustained it through the harshest of times.
It also survived the death of founder Larry Mitchell in 2016, whose picture still greets customers at the front door.
“He loved ice cream,” Linda said, “he was a great guy, everybody liked him.”
In a tribute to the departed founder, the newly dedicated mural on the store’s brick wall featured an image of the elder Mitchell holding an ice cream standing next to a cart. In the image, a Muni streetcar sped by and the hills of nearby Bernal Heights were depicted as mountains of ice cream. The illustration seemed to celebrate not only the business, but the generations of ice cream lovers who line-up most days for a cone or sundae.
“It’s kind of a tribute to my dad,” said Linda, “and also our neighborhood.”
