Stevens Point ice cream shop earns award for third year.
STEVENS POINT – Belts' Soft Serve has been chosen as the best place for a cheap date for the third time in Stevens Point Journal Media's Portage County's Best reader survey. We talked with manager Cole Racine about the award.
How did you get started? My grandparents actually started Belts' back in 1981 as a business venture, kind of thought it would be a fun business to get into and it turned about to be.
What can customers expect when they come to your business? We've got a good quality product, and we give generous portions. A lot of businesses say they have really friendly staffs, but we genuinely believe that ours is one of the best staffs in town. You get a good product, a good portion, a good ambiance (and) customer service experience. Hopefully it's just overall an enjoyable experience here. It's kind of a social thing in a lot of ways.
What sets your business apart from others? It's the customer service. We really try to find friendly outgoing people to serve the customers and, outside of that, we do our own homemade ingredients. ... We source fresh local fruit when it's in season. ... I think just that homemade quality is really what distinguishes us because, one thing I always tell our employees is, sure you could go get our Pointer anywhere else, but it's going to be processed cookie dough and brownies not fresh baked today. Quite frankly it's like I bake it today and we're using it by tomorrow. That's kind of our secret to our success. We've got good recipes, don't get me wrong, but it's not like it's a super secret recipe. Our biggest secret is just freshness.
What is something people would be surprised to learn about your business? I'm actually third generation running the business now, which I think is very unique. I think it makes (my grandfather) very proud that I've gone into the business. My dad ran it before me. ... It's not just that we're family owned, we're family operated.