Ë®¹ûÅÉAV

So their children — Finn, 9, Megan, 17, and Liam, 19 — often scream to go somewhere they'll enjoy: ice cream shops.

The result of those years of cones and sundaes across the country will open Thursday, Oct. 8, at 99 Genesee St. in downtown Auburn: Rudolph's Ice Cream.

Taking its name from the jewelry store that once occupied the space, the new artisanal ice cream business is being managed by Dawn and Megan. It will offer eight hard flavors and two soft ones by the cone or bowl, as well as specialty sundaes, ice cream nachos and sandwiches, and milkshakes and freak shakes (milkshakes with a decadent amount of toppings).

Rudolph's will also have ice cream cakes available for custom orders, and sometimes in stock.

Speaking to Ë®¹ûÅÉAV on Thursday, Dawn and Megan said they will eventually make all the ice cream at Rudolph's themselves. But for now, the shop is serving a mix of theirs and flavors from places like Purity Ice Cream Co. in Ithaca and Hedonist Artisan Ice Cream & Chocolates in Rochester. The Schulzes will offer dairy- and gluten-free alternatives, too.

The flavors at Rudolph's will fall on the adventurous side, they said, and change regularly. An early one is made with Straight Outta Locash Porter from the Schulzes' brewery, Prison City. That flavor is also part of a sundae called A Night at the Pub, which features bar snacks like pretzel bits, potato chips and Spanish peanuts, plus hot fudge and whipped cream.

The demands of running Prison City — and overseeing its $4.25 million expansion at 251 North St. — is one reason Rudolph's is opening well after the Schulzes planned, Dawn said.

She and Marc the downtown building, which previously housed Finger Lakes Variety & Sports, in December 2016. Their original business model for the first-floor commercial space was Rudolph's Sugar Shack, a candy shop that would also have served coffee, baked goods and other sweets, in addition to ice cream. But as the building's extensive renovation took longer than expected, the opening of other downtown businesses led the Schulzes to narrow their model down to just ice cream — which Dawn called "our true passion."

As of March, Rudolph's was supposed to open in May, Megan said, but the COVID-19 pandemic pushed the date back further.

Likewise, the pandemic has delayed the renovation of the historic building's upper three floors into four apartments. The Schulzes are slated to receive $173,000 from the city of Auburn's $10 million Downtown Revitalization Initiative grant to support the work. The renovation should begin sometime this winter, Dawn said.

She and her daughter realize the pandemic will also shape at least the first six months of business at Rudolph's. The state's COVID-19 guidance will limit the shop's capacity to 50%, along with requiring masks and other sanitation procedures. But the shop will offer takeout and curbside pickup, and the Schulzes are considering a pint-of-the-month club that will deliver. 

The pandemic will make Rudolph's different than the Schulzes imagined in another way, too: Megan wants the shop to serve as a youth hangout spot in a city that has few of them. Many of the 15 employees there are friends of hers, and fellow YMCA camp counselors. For now, though, she's enjoying bonding with her mother as they start a business together.

"Our reason for doing this is to have something fun to do with the kids, have them get involved in business and be able to spend some time together doing it," Dawn said.