Dock & Brew, a coffee and crêpe business, has opened a new hut at Mann Island on Liverpool's Pier Head, taking over the site previously occupied by Franco's Ice Cream, a family-run business that had traded there for more than 50 years.
The new outlet is the second Dock & Brew location, following the launch of its first site in Garston just four months ago. The business is run by Chris and Toni McPartland, whose family is also known for Spoon Desserts, a fleet of dessert trucks that appear at festivals and events across the country.
Franco's Ice Cream legacy
Franco's Ice Cream began as an ice cream van owned by Angelo Ferraiolo, who moved to the UK from Cozensa, Italy, and worked in the Stoke-on-Trent coal mines before an accident in the pit led him to seek less physically demanding work. In 1964, Angelo and his wife, Josephine, moved to Liverpool to start an ice cream business.
During Liverpool's FA Cup win in 1965, demand for ice cream was so high that Angelo moved the business into a wooden shack, named San Francisco Cabin after the patron saint of Italy. By 1980, the shack had been transformed into a brick shop with a kitchen, and Josephine, a former hospital cook, helped make it a family-run business.
New chapter at Mann Island
Angelo died in 2013, and his son Franco took over the shop, later renaming it Franco's Ice Cream "to bring it up to date, just after the pandemic." Franco previously told the ECHO: "Back then, there was no money in being a chef, so my dad bought me an ice cream van. He bought my brother one too, and that's how all of us got started. Everyone had an ice cream van. I've done this all of my life. I'm 76 this week and it keeps me busy. If you stay at home, you'll be vegetated, and it's a great place to be instead."
The new Dock & Brew site is a family affair, with Chris and Toni's son Thomas, 19, working behind the counter, while their daughters Sophie, Ella and Isla help serve customers and keep younger visitors entertained with colouring sheets. Speaking about the new site, the family told the ECHO: "Opening our second Dock & Brew site at Mann Island, just four months after launching in Garston, is a huge milestone for us. We're incredibly proud of how far we've come in such a short space of time and so grateful for the support we've received from our customers and local communities."
"We're excited to bring Dock & Brew to another Liverpool location and can't wait to see what this next chapter holds."
