There aren’t a lot of restaurants left that present you with a genuine smile and greeting as soon as you walk in the door. Snow Cove, located right across from Un Mundo Café in downtown Springfield, just so happens to be one of those places.
Kirsten Garvin, 25, has been working at Snow Cove since it opened in early June.
“[Working here] has been really good for me,” Garvin said. “It is really great seeing people coming in and getting an opportunity to help them feel happy.”
This local snow cone eatery is located at 117 South Fountain Avenue, within the Clark County Heritage Center and directly across from Un Mundo Café. Snow Cove is owned and operated by the Level family, who have connections to the Wittenberg community, as wife Meredith briefly taught within the business department.
Inside Snow Cove, the restaurant is livened by its warm-toned floors, bright colored walls and eccentric colored flavorings, all of which are handcrafted by Meredith and her husband, Micah. Students even have the opportunity to relax outside the building in brightly colored purple and blue lawn chairs, which resemble Wittenberg’s famous red lawn chairs.
For students on a budget, there is no need to fret. Small, flat-top snow cones are a dollar, small cones with a rounded top are two dollars, medium cones with a rounded top are three dollars and large round-topped snow cones are four dollars. Each snow cone has the ability to be upgraded to a glacier, which is a scoop of chocolate or vanilla ice cream within the snow cone, for an extra dollar.
“I really love our price point,” Garvin said. “Families can come in together and all get something reasonably priced.”
On the counter right below the menu rests 35 different flavors that Snow Cove carries, with new flavors being handcrafted every week. One of Garvin’s friends and customers discovered that there were millions of different syrup combinations to be had.
Snow Cove offers a variety of its own blended flavors, featuring one called The Dark Knight, which was a snow cone with black cherry and black raspberry syrups. For those who want to try them all, you certainly can.
“A few weeks ago, we had a kid come in and ask for every single flavor,” Garvin said. “It looked disgusting, but he was so happy.”
Although Snow Cove will be closing for the season in September, Garvin shared hopes for both the company’s future and her future at Snow Cove.
“It would be really neat to be open year-round,” Garvin said. “Maybe we could try some kind of chocolate mixture, or something of the sort. This is just a really great place to be.”
Students have a limited opportunity to try Snow Cove before the store closes shop for the season. From now until the end of its season in September, Wittenberg students, when presenting student I.D.s, can receive a free upgrade from a regular snow cone to a glacier for free.