Letter: Dear Lakewood ice cream truck owners

I live in a development in Lakewood, and I wanted to know if it’s really necessary to come in and sell ice cream every single day on our block?

Lakewood and the surrounding areas is a lot real estate to cover. As I am writing this, there are two competing ice cream trucks parked on our block. I understand your need to make a parnassa, BUT do I really need to be harassed and made to feel like a bad mother every single day, when my kids ask me for ice cream money? Do I need to see five or ten kids crying every day when they are told NO ICE CREAM today by their parents (because they are barely making ends meet and last thing they need to do is have an extra $10 a day expense for ice cream and slushes)?

DO u need to show up at bedtime and play your loud music so all of our children start jumping up and down and mess up bed time? I’m pretty sure my feelings are the same as thousands of parents around our town. Please try and come maybe every other day or better maybe every three days. To come every day, especially at late hours and make thousands of kids plead and beg for ice cream, is not “cool”. They are kids, they don’t understand very easily why they can’t have ice cream every single time your truck pulls in.

I have asked the truck numerous times to please park down the block and not in front of my home but to no avail.

Than you in advance

YN.

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23 COMMENTS

  1. Send them to my block! They have great soft ice cream far cheaper than the ice cream stores. I wish there was some way to know where they are parked on days that I would love to get my kids a refreshing treat without the sheep and expense of going to the store. GPS tracking?

    • Ok, as someone who buys a lot of ice cream I would like to explain a few things that would address many of the comments here.There were always two trucks in lakewood Oh Yummy and Traveling Treats.
      The other three trucks you see going around lakewood (dark blue, light blue, and white) are from a company in the mountains (Music is…Come and make a Bracha…..) The trucks everyone is complaining about is from this company. There are many complaints about them in the mountains as well. Especially after the story last year with Shmuel Gellis A”H. One of them was towed away by the health department a couple of weeks ago. Some comments are saying how good the ice cream is and some are saying it is not good…well there are different companies…some are good and some are not….. Vihameven Yavin

  2. The law in New Jersey requires all frozen desert ice cream trucks to be equiped with flashing red lights and a swing out stop sign.
    Drivers passing a frozen desert truck must come to a complete stop and if clear, proceed past the truck at no more than 10 MPH.
    For some reason this law does not seem to apply to trucks selling chalav yisroel products.
    Is there a reason why our kids lives worth less than kids who eat chalav stam products?

  3. I understand how you feel. B’h i do not have the same issue and the trucks on our block are not a challenge for us. The message to my children is unspoken but very clear: it makes no difference who is getting ice cream. WE don’t buy ice cream from ice cream trucks. Period. I have never had any issue.

    I tell my children all the time, “the faster you learn not to look around and compare yourself to others the happier you will be. Now the peer pressure is for ice cream or the latest toy but soon it will be to have the mansion that your neighbor has, the car that your coworker drives…the new necklace your sister got… “its endless. and you’ll always be wanting and you’ll always be lacking and unhappy.

    When the ice cream truck is not selling kosher ice cream, there are no issues – because purchasing it is just NOT a possibility. When you/your kids start living a life where what your next door neighbor or what his/her child has is just as off limits, its really so much less of a nisayon.

    the line we say in the grocery store when a toddler looks at some candy on the shelf is, “its not ours, we can’t have it”. repeat this lesson again and again as they grow.

  4. I asked the local supermarkets to not display unnecessary foods that not meant to be consumed for Ruchnias reasons. and they also refused using the “Parnasah” excuse.
    I decided to take the bull by its horns and now I just ignore the other foods in spite of the fact that my offspring as well as my urges lay it on thick that I’m a bad person ans a terrible parent.
    So far it worked pretty well. It even went as far as they telling me that maybe, just maybe we don’t really need it and it’s just ”taay’vah.
    It seems that working on one self really has a shot if you only are persistent and patient.
    Elul would be a great time to give it a whirl.

  5. Its not just a chinuch issue of teaching your kids that they don’t need what everyone else is getting. In the summer there were many days we had 3 trucks come. Even if they know their family is not getting, its still rubbing it in their faces way too many times a day/week.
    Its also not ok to park in front of someone’s house with such loud music at 8:30PM.
    @Ari, they are more expensive and not as good as the ice cream stores.

  6. As the wife of a very honest and hard-working ice cream truck owner, I always first tell people that you either love us or hate us for what we do. There are always those that will take issue with a truck selling ice cream at their doorstep, and those that think it’s the best thing in the world! My husband too has encountered difficulties this year unfortunately due another owner overstepping his territory. He is using a similar business name and visits the neighborhoods right before my husband’s scheduled time. My husband is very careful to only visit a neighborhood once a week and never more and he will not play his music after 6:00 or 7:00…he’s usually home by the time it gets dark. People call us all the time with requests and he is very careful to make his customers happy. He’s had people ask to park elsewhere and not to come after a certain time, and he is happy to oblige (they also ask to come on Rosh Chodesh, and on the nights they serve milchigs…:) So, if you ever have any requests, positive or negative from the Oh Yummy ice cream truck (we are not the Yummy Ice Cream Truck, yes, we know it’s confusing :(..please call us at 732-Oh-Yummy and we will do our best to please you. May Hashem send everyone their Parnasa in an honest way!!

    • The Oh Yummy ice cream truck owner is fantastic! We once had him come to an event and he was super accommodating and a real pleasure to work with, a real mentch. Your family should have much bracha and hatzlacha, even with the competition and that similar name:(

  7. I hear the point and I agree. I just don’t know if you can impose your grievences however valid on others. The point about loud music and bedtime is absolutely true. I have had to walk to blocks to get a once cream truch to lower the music.

  8. This has very little to do with chinch and much more to do with the ice cream trucks causing chaos every day of the week and three times a day from diff trucks . DOnt these guys have buy a route or something when they get a permit ? I tell my kids no and just bc neighbor has doesn’t mean we need to have . Im just sick of telling them know three times a day for 5 days and then once or twice yes. Its ridiculous that my kids come running in every three times a day begging for money for ice cream. The yard 5 and 7 and are not really at age where they fully understand . No reason why thousands of parents have to say no, no , no at 830 at night bc of some guys parnassa . The township should make all three companies have separate routes like food trucks and split days up and thats it .

  9. I agree 100%. I wish this could have been posted in the beginning of the summer. I don’t hold anything against the ice cream truck drivers or owners. They are just trying to make a Parnassah. I just wish there was a better option as it is really getting out of hand.
    Thank you

  10. Last summer we had an uce cream truck driver tell us he comes to our neighborhood every tuesday night at about 530. We all made sure to give our kids milchig suppers before then so that we knew they ate supper and the ice cream wont deter them, and they werent fleishig. It worked so well. We were so happy to let our kids get ice cream once a week! And it never came more often than that.
    This summer, i live in toms river and weve never had a kosher ice cream truck come. If there are too many trucks, maybe they want to come to toms river or jackson? (Idk if laws allow or they have permits for only lakewood?)

  11. As a resident and driver in this town. I see any times 3-4 trucks come down my block. Sickly the kids begging parents while holding from the last truck. What’s also notable is that they slow down traffic by driving 10MPH all around town. and they do not pullover to safe spots. I completely understand your frustrations. Sadly there’s no1 home when it comes to such people

  12. if theres nothing halachically wrong then even if it inconveniences you you have no right to complain, that would be lashon hara. now i am not sure that there is nothing halachically wrong, but those complaining better figure that out. (there does seem to be a clear violation of dina d’malchusa, but that isnt the contention here). in judiasm you dont get to air your grievances just because something is inconvenient to you.
    (if it is wrong then it might not be lashon hara [to spread publicly] if your intention is not to harm but to benefit the recipients of misdeeds)

Comments are closed.