Mister Softee Has an App to Find Ice Cream Vans

Most individuals assume that there’s just one solution to monitor down a Mister Softee ice cream truck: hear out for the jaunty, irritatingly loud jingle. Through the muggy summers in New York Metropolis, that technique is normally efficient — particularly because it looks like there’s a Mister Softee truck hanging at each park nook, blocking each final bike lane. However for anybody in search of their smooth serve repair outdoors of the Large Apple (yep, there are 625 Mister Softee vans throughout 18 states), a jingle can solely go thus far. 

“Persons are keen to drive 10 to fifteen minutes to trace a truck down as a result of there might solely be one truck in that county in comparison with the 20 to 30 vans in [the Northeast],” says Mike Conway, Mister Softee’s vp. “Right here on the entrance workplace, that’s one of many principal questions we get. They name and say, “Hey, the place’s the truck? I want ice cream now.’” 

It turns on the market’s one other solution to find Mister Softee vans, and it’s been proper underneath our noses since 2020. That’s proper — Mister Softee has an app, and it is had an app for 4 years. Is that this the primary time you’re studying about it? You’re not alone.

To most New Yorkers, Mister Softee has all the time felt elusive. We don’t take into consideration the place the vans come from within the morning or the place they go at evening. They only form of seem as quickly because the climate reaches north of 60 levels. It’s a factor that solely exists inside the confines of your cravings for sub-par smooth serve or a Spongebob popsicle that appears extra like a horror film villain. There’s one thing pleasantly easy and timeless about that — as if New Yorkers within the ‘50s had the very same relationship to Mister Softee as we do now. 

Due to that, it’s onerous to think about Mister Softee being related to one thing as trendy as a smartphone app. However actually, the app is simply as elusive as Mister Softee itself. 

The principle function of the app is its map perform. Its homepage is actually an Apple map flooded with cartoonified photos of Mister Softee vans. You possibly can enter your zip code or share your location — each choices will present you ways shut you might be to an ice cream truck. Click on on a picture of a truck, and also you’ll discover its identify (normally one thing easy, like “Bronx truck 18”) and the way lengthy the truck has “been on the highway for.”

Almost each truck in Manhattan has been “on the highway” since July 18th, 2023 — a whole coincidence, absolutely! You can even click on “View Menu,” which takes you to what ought to have been Mister Softee’s full menu. Alas, it actually solely reveals simply the vans’ chocolate and vanilla smooth serve choices.

Faucet the data button and also you’ll be led to an “About Us” web page. “Welcome to the App of Mister Softee! This app will permit you to find your native Mister Softee franchise, find out about turning into a franchisee, find out about non-public events with Mister Softee and obtain our jingle,” it reads. As described, there’s a “Historical past” web page, a contact kind for get together and occasion requests, and a web page that describes how Mister Softee actually, actually needs you to turn into a franchise proprietor. 

Fleets of Mister Softee ice cream vans are owned by franchisees, and people franchisees are in a position to determine whether or not or not they want their vans seen on the app. “We didn’t wish to make it necessary,” Conway advised me. So actually, there are solely a choose variety of vans which are traceable. For reference, once I take a look at New York Metropolis on the app, I can see dozens in Manhattan and the Bronx and solely two in Queens and two in Brooklyn. Let me guarantee you — I dwell in Brooklyn and there’s a minimum of six common Mister Softees in my neighborhood alone. 

Both manner, for those who actually have a hankering for ice cream, you would possibly wish to go the space for it. The true query is, does the Mister Softee app truly work? I made a decision to try it out.

I appeared on the map and located the closest truck: Bronx truck 76 on seventeenth Road and Broadway. I made the 30-minute trek north and handed two Mister Softee vans on the best way (each of which weren’t current on my app). Nonetheless, I continued on, took the subway to Union Sq. and as quickly as I stepped outdoors I noticed it. Bronx truck 76 was precisely the place the app mentioned it will be.

I requested the motive force, Oswaldo, if he knew concerning the app. He advised me that he had heard about it, however didn’t assume his boss needed him on it. I advised him he was, in reality, on the app. He shrugged, I ordered a snowcone, after which he drove off to a brand new location because the loud jingle performed via the truck’s speaker.