The new cold war!
Mr Softee sees off Mr Whippy in ice cream van pitch battle
WHEN ice cream seller Debbie Head found out a rival had moved in on her pitch she decided to play it cool.
Instead of having a full-on row with the interloper, she opted to hit him in the pocket.
The 57-year- old drove to the beauty spot and parked her Mr Softee van directly in front of her rival – blocking access to the serving hatch. Despite no one being able to buy from him, the Mr Whippy van owner remained where he had parked for a further two hours before finally giving up.
Mrs Head has been selling ice cream at the seaside village of Milford in the New Forest, Hampshire, since 2013, after giving up a career as a driving instructor.
She said: ‘There is an unwritten rule among street traders that you don’t just turn up and start trading on an existing pitch.
‘I have run my business for the last six years but we can trace the previous i owners of f th the b business i back at least 50 years. I have invested a lot of my time and money in it. I am a local person serving locally made New Forest Ice Cream and I use local traders for all my van needs.
‘On the second day of a skiing holiday in France I got a text from a friend telling me what was happening.
‘When I got home, I decided I would get the van out of storage. It wasn’t actually that nice a day, but I thought I had to get the van out. I asked the Mr Whippy van owner to move, but it was clear he wasn’t going to.
‘So I just decided to park as close to his van as I could so no one could get to it.
‘I hadn’t done anything wrong here, you don’t just turn up and start selling from someone else’s pitch.’
Mrs Head said the rival seller has not returned since she took the drastic action. She added: ‘There isn’t enough trade there for more than one van and if there was, what’s to say I wouldn’t have had a second van there already.’
Mrs Head, who also acts as an unofficial information point for tourists visiting nearby attraction Hurst Castle, said: ‘I have a lot of support from the local people and I feel that I, in turn, support them too.’