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The Bar Harbor Story is generously sponsored by Witham Family Hotels.
by Sabrina Martin/BDN
BAR HARBOR — The owner of a nationally recognized Bar Harbor ice cream chain purchased an Ellsworth building to expand production space for the business.
Linda Marie Parker, founder of Mt. Desert Island Ice Cream — which has six locations, including two in Bar Harbor, one in Portland, one in Washington, D.C., and three in Japan — announced the purchase Thursday on Facebook.
The new production space will be at the Koller Building at 204 Water Street, roughly one block from Zeppa’s New York Pizza and across from Maine Shellfish Co.
The move marks the latest expansion of a popular locally owned ice cream chain that for more than 20 years has received national recognition for its innovative artisanal products. The shop offers a variety of unique flavors, including cinnamon cardamom and french toast ice cream.
Parker was unavailable for comment Friday when the Bangor Daily News contacted her.
It was not immediately clear if the Ellsworth location would also serve ice cream, or if it would be used solely for production. If the group decides to set up a store at the Water Street building, it would not be open until 2027, according to Parker’s post.
The purchase, which followed years of searching for the correct location, will allow the chain to reopen its lower Main Street store in Bar Harbor, according to Parker’s Facebook post.
In 2011, Parker’s shop was named one of the country’s top 25 ice cream shops by Food and Wine magazine, a prominent monthly culinary periodical. The store also welcomed then-President Barack Obama and his family in 2010 during a two-day family vacation on the island.
Parker started the ice cream company in 2005, and has since then expanded to six stores through partnerships with domestic and international businesses.
In April, Mt. Desert Island Ice Cream added its third Japanese location in Hakuba, Nagano, the site of many of the 1998 Winter Olympics events. The pop-up store is situated in the lobby of the Gakusui, a hostel that sits at the foot of a ski resort in the Japanese Alps.
Parker, who worked as a junior high school teacher for four years in Japan in the 1990s, opened her first international location in 2020, bringing her Maine ice cream shop to Matsumoto, Japan, according to the Mount Desert Islander. She and her partners have since also opened a shop in Azumino, Japan.
This story appears through a media partnership with the Bangor Daily News.
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