The ICEE Company is a beverage company located in Ontario, California, USA. Its flagship product is the ICEE, which is a frozen carbonated beverage that comes in various fruit and soda flavors. ICEE also produces other frozen beverages, and Italian ice pops under both the ICEE and Slush Puppie brands. The company's mascot is an anthropomorphic cartoon polar bear. It has been a division of J & J Snack Foods Corporation since 1988.
Today, the ICEE Company has over 75,000 ICEE machines across the United States, which serve 300 million ICEEs per year. McDonald's and Subway restaurants inside Wal-Mart stores sell ICEEs. Burger King restaurants in the United States and Canada sell ICEEs and ICEE Floats. Target and Wawa also sell ICEEs inside their stores. In Mexico, ICEE is widely available at department stores such as Sears and Wal-Mart, and inside movie theaters and convenience stores. ICEE is also the primary frozen beverage sold in Wawa and Quick Chek, two convenience store chains located in the Mid-Atlantic region of the US. Valero gas stations co-branded with their CornerStore marts (except for those independently owned) sell the ICEE.
7-Eleven licenses the ICEE and markets it as the Slurpee.[1] Circle K licensed the ICEE in 1998 as their ThirstFreezer. [2]
The ICEE machine was invented in the early 1960s by Omar Knedlik, a local Dairy Queen restaurant owner, in Coffeyville, Kansas. He had been placing bottles of soda in his freezer until they were frozen since he did not have a soda fountain. The frozen drinks were extremely popular and he soon realized that he needed a machine to make the product. After 5 years, he had invented the ICEE Machine. He originally wanted his drink product to be called "scoldasice". However, he asked a local artist and friend, Ruth E. Taylor, to create a marketing name and logo for his invention. She developed the name "ICEE", as well as the logo's icicles hanging down from the top of the block letters, which has not changed to this day. She also created an accompanying "polar bear", which has undergone dramatic changes over the years. By the mid-1960s, 300 ICEE machines had been manufactured.[3][4]