Ben & Jerry’s chooses site in Old Town

FORT COLLINS — Ready for the scoop?

Ben & Jerry’s Scoop Shop is coming to town in June, news certain to leave thousands of Fort Collins ice-cream fans melting with anticipation.

The outlet will be owned by Lee and Ann Swanson, long-time Fort Collins residents who have traveled a Rocky Road of psychological and business-oriented tests, hours of interviews and a three-day stint at a Dayton, Ohio, ice-cream shop.

“We are really excited and really nervous,” Lee Swanson said.

In late May, the pair will undergo two weeks of intensive training at Ben & Jerry’s Homemade Inc.’s Waterbury, Vermont, headquarters and will then return home for a grand opening at their newly renovated Old Town Square location.

Swanson, owner of Swan Graphics, said he and his wife were looking for a more family-friendly business that they could be involved in together, when they called Ben & Jerry’s franchise hotline and learned the Vermont-based ice cream manufacturer was looking for Scoop Shop franchisees in two locations: New York City and Colorado.

A Scoop Shop opened three months ago in Boulder, and there are plans for a third store in Denver.

“They had chosen Fort Collins, Boulder and Denver long before they picked the candidates,” Swanson said. “They come in and do traffic counts, and then they kind of wait for the phone to ring.”

The Swansons underwent rigorous testing and interviews in a process designed to assure the company that the couple is serious about commiting to a career of baking cookies, brownies and cones, and dishing up scoops of breathtakingly tasty slabs of full-fat ice cream and nonfat (horrors!) sorbet.

The Swansons have contracted with Paul Hoffman, president of Delta Construction Inc., to transform the 1,600-square foot retail space formerly occupied by the Children’s Merchantile, into a cheery Holstein-themed ice-cream joint, where farm fencing guides patrons through the line.

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