A chat with Calvin Kayes, founder and owner of Loop and Scoop.
*Loop and Scoop is specialized in the production of homemade churros and gelato.
It has 2 locations at the moment, 665 Great Western Rd in Glasgow and 157 Milngavie Road in
Bearsden. Opening soon also in the Southside of Glasgow.
After getting lost three times because google maps sent me in the wrong direction, I arrived at the Loop and Scoop Warehouse in Kinning Park industrial estate.
During my time as a business owner, I have been in lots of warehouses but never in one that looks like a boutique shop. The order inside is close to being maniacal and it gives you a sensation of breathing order, cleanliness, and elegance. All under the famous orange and white brand colors and graphics.
Two floors: downstairs is the classic space dedicated to all the material for the shops and then there is the stairway to heaven where gelato production takes place.
There is a lab where Francesco, one of the gelatai, is literally scooping by hand the ice cream into small tubs and making fresh mint and chocolate ice cream batches. On the side there are some milk pasteurizer machines where the process starts, from scratch, and then there is a freezer room where the ice cream stays before being transported with the vans to the shops. Cold chain can't be broken!
Making ice cream can seem easy as few ingredients are used but mastering the art and give to the public an excellent product requires years of studying and experience.
Every detail of it. Milk, ingredients, process, storage, transport, shop displays.
Calvin talks about it with the enthusiasm of a child but with the knowledge of a person that is in the field for a long time. Without any arrogance but with the spirit of learning in progress and improving every day.
Are there mistakes in making gelato?
Sometimes yes, he says, and we start again from the beginning and look where the mistake is, where it started, if it was in the production, or the room temperature, or if it was the display in the shop. We figure it out and learn and work not to do this again.
He learned to do gelato a long time ago, going to gelato Uni and doing courses in Italy but also observing his wife's Serena family business Porrelli, a long-standing leaders in gelato production in Scotland. He knows what he is doing.
People queue out of his shops in Great Western Road and Bearsden but he never switches off to find ways to make his products to the next level and offer an unforgettable experience to his customers.
He shows me through the cameras the work just done in the west end brunch to facilitate queues, to make a window just for deliveries, and to place a brand new display for the gelato.
He laughs saying: "I am a perfectionist, I am married to this business, there is not a moment of my day where I do not think about it. I do not have an exact time to say when my day is over as there are a lot of variables going on when running a business. I breathe churros and gelato".
Despite the fact he got a fabulous team- he does not call them staff as it does not describe well the bond they all have together- to work with, he is trying to be a bit everywhere, with a little regret of not being more in the kitchen experimenting new flavors or products.
He is a volcano, his phone is burning but he wants to keep going with his story so I went down a bit into memory lane and asked the icebreaker question.
How did it start? Why churros and gelato?
I think it was in 2013 I saw the first van selling churros at an event I was at with my family business.
Literally did not know what churros were but I tried them and I liked the idea.
I did the typical Calvin and immersed myself in it. I do like this with everything I am interested in, I get obsessed and I researched, until 2 or 3 in the morning, until I become an expert.
I went to Spain back and forward for few times, I wanted to see and learn how to make them, check the equipment, what was the process, and how it needed to be adapted here in Scotland. Even if you have only 3 ingredients, water salt, and flour, nobody tells you how to make them exactly, it is like a secret.
We needed to find out through trial and error to find the best version of it.
Then I finally developed my own churro recipe and matched with all the fillings you find now ( nutella peanut butter, biscoff, kinder bueno) and we experimented a bit like with our takes on the oyster or the arch. I am developing a new churro product but will be out maybe in a year- secret secret- stay tuned!
When I met Serena, my wife, she comes from a famous ice cream family, we were doing really important events around the country with my other business. When we decided to have a family we realized we wanted permanent roots and we decided to invest in our first shop. (even if someone told us that was not the right location and that we were making a mistake)
People see queues outside your shops and sometimes think running a business is all sunshine and rainbows. Was the beginning hard? And how is it going?
I have kind of blurry memories from that time- Calvin says- probably because I was working almost 24/7. But I have clear the unconscious fear I had at the beginning of opening a shop focused only on churros and ice cream. I knew the product I was offering could be welcomed well because I have done churros in events since 2014 and people loved it. But I was concerned that people would come to my shop to eat "only" them.
We laughed when we remembered that Loop and Scoop's first menu also featured sandwiches and brunch. I killed the menu, he continues, in the first three days as some items were just impossible to make. All things you learn on the way- I got a collection of the menus we have changed in the last few years!
I am honest, he follows, I did not know if this business would work in the first months as I was feeling incredible pressure of doing well. My wife Serena was heavily pregnant when we started and when we had the baby I worked until 4 am the night before to be able to be with her in the hospital. Then straight after there was Beast from the East snow and I could not afford to close, I went myself to pick up members of my team to be able to open.
It has been an interesting journey. If I look back from where we started and see where we are now I am proud of the work done and of the results achieved.
It has not been easy navigating through these years. Brexit, Covid, and an increase in costs just need to be added to all the tax return, vat bills, insurances, mandatory compliances we have. Running a business is a job in itself and then there is the creative side of it. And this is probably my most difficult choice, to run a business, stay compliant, and tick all those boxes but also get the time to be creative and do all the other stuff.
But we did it thanks to a fabulous team and thanks to our customers.
There will be store number 3 opening soon in Southside.
I hope to have this ready before summertime. We are working hard on it. Queen's Park is a lovely area and can't wait to open there in an iconic site as Queen's Park Cafe. I feel honored to open up in a place like this, full of history. The shop will have of course our branding colors but there will not be any whitewashing of the glorious past, on the opposite I want to celebrate them. The relations I developed with the landlord have been amazing, I had received only great words of encouragement from them.
I am happy that with this new opening, there will be 15/20 jobs but also that the majority of refurbishment is done by Scottish companies.
With 3 shops people may think your business is transforming into a chain but I know this is not true.
I can confirm we are not a chain and we do not want to be.
Maybe my obsession with details, to have everything polished may bring people to think that.
We try to use as many Scottish suppliers as possible. We use Mossgiel farm for our milk, and Dear Green for our coffee and a lot of ingredients are sourced locally.
We are small and boutique, we are still a family business that has grown and needed to be better organized to keep up with demand and to keep the same quality we started with.
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