Following their retirement, business partners Irene Baum and Kathy Fleming got the itch to start a new venture, but they didn't want to get into something too time consuming or demanding.
So the pair came up with the perfect business: ice cream.
Baum and Fleming opened Screwballs Frozen Delights in Locust Point over Memorial Day weekend. The spot at 1400 Towson St. sells 30 flavors of snowballs and 13 flavors of hand-dipped ultra-premium ice cream, or ice cream with at least 17 percent milkfat.
The ice cream, which is free of growth hormones, comes from Moorenko's Ice Cream Caf� in Silver Spring. Their flavors include salted caramel with pralines, orange chocolate chip, cotton candy gummy bear and cookie dough.
Screwballs, outfitted like a 1950s-style ice cream parlor, also sells milk shakes, floats and banana splits. Baum could not say how much the partners spent to open the business, located on the first floor of a 1,220-square-foot rowhouse.
"We found a lovely spot in Locust Point that's perfect or an ice cream parlor," says Baum, a former division manager of a tobacco company.
The shop owners were not interested in, say, starting a full-service restaurant that would require around-the-clock hours and supervising a number of employees.
"We wanted something that just the two of us could handle on our own," Baum says. "It gives us flexibility on time, " says Baum, who plans to close the shop three months during winter.
Though Baum lives in Anne Arundel County's Glen Burnie, she decided Locust Point would be the best fit for the business.
"It's a very close-knit community with lots of kids and families," Baum says. "We've gotten great feedback and support from the neighbors. I grew up in the city and this reminds me of the city I grew up in where everyone knew everyone else."
And how did the business owners come up with the name? It's a joke between Baum and Fleming.
"We used to call each other screwballs. We're just two goofy people," Baum says.
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Writer: Julekha Dash
Source; Irene Baum, Screwballs