Leading Economic Indicators: Ice Cream Truck Thuggery

Or is the horrible truth about the ice cream truck business that it resembles Amway? Too many trucks, too little territory:

Few sounds evoke the languorous innocence of childhood summers like the jingle of a roving ice cream truck, its melody drawing streams of children clutching crumpled dollar bills.

In this part of Queens, however, ice cream trucks have become a symbol of sharp elbows, more reminiscent of “Goodfellas” than Good Humor. Martin Price has taken his white and aquamarine Kool Man truck through Maspeth, Glendale and Middle Village for 25 years, but he has complained to the police that a franchisee for Mr. Softee has warned him a dozen times over the past two seasons to stay out Maspeth and Middle Village.

The most recent threats came on July 22, Mr. Price said, when three Mr. Softee trucks and a green Ford Econovan carrying the franchisee converged on his Kool Man truck at 56th Road and 60th Street in Maspeth. The franchisee, who Mr. Price said did not identify himself, was carrying a baseball bat and, according to Mr. Price, warned him: “I bought the area.”

“You don’t own the street,” Mr. Price responded.

But he has been so scared by the possibility of violence that he has been staying away from Maspeth and parts of Middle Village at a cost of 40 percent of his business, he said.

Earlier: This Is No Softee.