Feb. 28, 2024

With a high temperature in the mid-60s Friday, expect to see lines as the first B&G Milkyway locations begin to open for the ice cream-selling season.

The B&G at Harmodon Park on East 41st Street and the newest one in the Sioux Falls-based chain at 69th and Cliff will start selling soft-serve twists, Avalanches and footlong hot dogs on the first day of March.

The B&G Milkyway at 69th and Cliff opened in June 2023.

“Friday looks amazing, and this weekend is going to be so amazing,” said Andrew Gibbins, who owns the Harmodon Park location with his wife, Lindsay.

“We’re making all the handmade novelties, getting inventory ready, and it’s looking good,” he said Tuesday. “We’re excited to get going.”

They have most of their staff in place but could use a few more people for after-school shifts.

While five of the nine locations in the Sioux Falls area will open in the first week of March, a remodeling project at the Sycamore Avenue location will push its opening to mid-March. Franchise owners and brothers Kasey and Travis Iverson have removed the lobby and added walk-up windows for ordering and pickup. They’re waiting on countertops to arrive and hope to open March 12.

The shop has been drive-thru only since the lobby closed at the start of the COVID pandemic in 2020. The area had been turned into much-needed storage space, but now the Iversons are giving customers another option for ordering food.

“Hopefully by adding the window, we can get the customers that like the ‘old-school’ feel,” Kasey Iverson said. “It also allows us a little more space in the building.”

The Iversons also own the B&G’s in Brandon and Harrisburg. They are looking for more daytime help.

Cramped space also has kept the lobby closed at the West 41st Street location. Over the winter, the shop polled customers if they’d rather keep the drive-thru or reopen the lobby. The drive-thru was the overwhelming favorite, said Bruce Bettmeng who owns that location and the walk-up only one on West 12th Street and sells the franchises for the other sites.

This year, there aren’t any planned additions to the menu, he said. The cod sandwich that was introduced last year will be back until Easter.

“We’re going to continue our monthly specials with limited-time different flavors for Avalanches,” he said. That includes the popular Twin Bing-inspired, toasted coconut and peach flavors.

March will kick off with a mint flavor.

Inflationary pressures made a difference in sales last year, he said.

But overall, “it was good. I can’t complain. … Costs have settled down from last year.” Supply chain issues are better too, he noted.

Here are the opening dates or time frame for each B&G Milkyway location:

• 69th & Cliff: Friday
• East 41st Street near Harmodon Park: Friday
• 69th & Louise: March 4
• Harrisburg: March 5
• West 41st Street: March 6
• Tea: March 11
• Sycamore Avenue: March 12, tentative
• Brandon: Mid-March
• West 12th Street: April 1, possibly late March