Cleary’s Ice Cream & Candy Bar

Since I heard about Cleary’s several months ago, I’ve been wanting to give it a try as I’ve been wanting a great ice cream place nearby. Having it being a small, locally-​owned business made it even more desirable as I love supporting the local commerce. At least two attempts at trying Cleary’s failed because we tried to go once after a movie, but it was already closed. Another time when a midtown dessert place was absolutely packed with a line way out the door, I suggested we go to Cleary’s, but once again it was already closed. This time it was relatively early on a Saturday night and we new they were still open so finally we got to give it a go.
What a disappointment. The first indicator that something was amiss was the simple fact that the place was completely empty on a Saturday summer evening. Even though it wasn’t terribly hot, there still should have been people there. Nonetheless, we ordered from the extensive menu. Everything is based on basic, vanilla soft-​serve ice cream. From there you add a flavoring (one is free, additional ones will cost you), then you can add mix-​ins at 50 cents a pop. Both lists (flavors and mix-​ins) are pretty extensive. You can also add a hard shell if you like for an extra cost. If you have trouble deciding, they have some suggestions for you.
Even if you just do the basics, the price is pretty high, we didn’t go all out and it was $ 9.00 for two small cups. But I don’t mind paying that much if it was really good. It just wasn’t.
When you boil it down, it was just expensive soft-​serve – and not particularly good soft-​serve. There was nothing bad about it, but there was nothing that would set it above what you could get at Dairy Queen, perhaps not even as good and certainly Cleary’s was a smaller portion.
I had to take several spoonfuls and really concentrate to taste the added flavoring. So, I have to say that the flavoring does nothing to enhance the ice cream. Perhaps they need to add more, for the price you pay you should be able to taste what you ordered. However, my biggest beef was with the mix-​ins. After a couple of bites, I was pretty certain that they added in the wrong thing. It should tell you something about how much they put in when it’s hard to tell if it was what you asked for. When I spoke to the young lady, who didn’t seem particularly interested in her job, she simply said that she put in the right ingredient. After a few more bites, I was not only sure it wasn’t what I ordered, but what it actually was. I didn’t bring it up again because I wasn’t in the mood for a discussion/​argument – which is what I’m sure I would have gotten – and it probably wouldn’t have been any better.
The whole time we were there, we were their only patrons. Without some major improvements, I don’t see Cleary’s lasting long. We certainly won’t be back. I really want to support the local, small businesses, but they have to do their share by providing value and a good product and service. By value I don’t necessarily mean inexpensive. If you’re going to charge a premium price, you have to provide a premium product. Cleary’s does not.

Cleary’s was not the sweet shop I was expecting. First visit and what a disappointment! The set-​up and presentation of their products is laughable. I’ve seen better «candy bars» at kids parties held at a public park! Décor is unremarkable and boring. Their main selection of candies is against one wall, with a few other shelves on the back wall, and then the «ice cream bar» with a few stools lined up on the other side with the register. I was looking for a specific candy, which they didn’t have. But then there wasn’t much of a selection to choose from at all. They do not carry any chocolate items. Most of the candy you can find at the Dollar Store or at any grocery store. Nothing special, especially when the bulk price is $ 3 per ¼lb. I ended up buying about 10 pieces of a root beer flavored hard candy shaped like a barrel for $ 3.
I really don’t mind paying more for different, exotic, retro, or rare candy (Andy’s Candy Apothecary comes to mind) but, at least make it a nice customer experience for me to shop! Since they are a fairly new business and quite a small operation, I would expect better customer service. How about a «Hi, welcome to Cleary’s!» or «May I help you?» or at least a damn «Hello»!!! When I walked in the young lady working was talking to 3 other young people sitting at the ice cream bar. She carried on her conversation while I was browsing the candy wall. Another older gentlemen walked in a few minutes after me, and did not get any kind of greeting either. He walked in and walked out. At least when she rang me up, she was pleasant.
I can think of a ton of other places I’d rather go to get my ice cream and candy fix.

I just bought a bag of their bulk candy (sour patch kids, sour strips, peach and apple rings) and it all tastes pretty stale and like they’ve been sitting for a while. The ice cream was pretty good, it’s a different style of soft serve.

My first time at Cleary“s ice cream, the cinnamon ice cream was off the hook. The only thing better than the ice cream, was the customer service we received from the server Jessica.

A friend of mine brought me to Cleary’s a few months ago (before that I had never seen it!) and I had been wanting to return ever since! As soon as I walked in, I loved it. The shop is very well decorated– modern but cute and colorful. The first time I visited, the guy working there explained to me how it works: you pick your base, frozen yogurt or custard, and then your flavor, and then you can pick mix-​ins. The first time, I decided on one of their pre designed flavor combos (these change from time to time with their seasonal ingredients), which was a salted caramel custard with nutella. I had never had frozen custard before– and it was amazing– smooth and creamy, and you can tell it was SALTED caramel– which I love. There’s nothing worse than a salt-​less salted caramel dessert. I got this in a cup, and for some reason, it melted EVERYWHERE. My friend’s didn’t, but for some reason mine was a giant mess. Perhaps they had added too much caramel and it was too liquid-​y, I’m not sure.
The second time I came in, nutella was not listed on their mix-​ins or flavors, and I was bummed because I liked it so much. I got salted caramel again with brownie as my mix in. It redeemed itself– no melting! However, a few minutes after I started eating, I noticed the girl working using nutella in someone’s shake. I guess they had it even though it wasn’t listed. I wish I had asked, but they should keep it on their menu, everyone loves nutella. Oh well, I will be back anyway!

Good in theory, but just didn’t do it for me.
I had the milkshare toffee flavored with heath n oreo. To my disappointment the milkshake just tasted like vanilla and wasn’t as thick in texture as I would have liked.
My friend also had a milkshake peanut butter flavored with cakebatter. He wasn’t too thrilled either.
But to be fair, the third one of our bunch had a coffee flavored ice cream come and she was very happy with her dessert.

This place is amazing! Great selection of flavors (my favorite is custard butter pecan mixed with cookie dough) and you can mix and match any flavors you want for a delicious treat.
Don’t be afraid to come in and try it out. It’s like McDonalds vanilla soft served on crack x a million flavor combos. Plus they have a small but great selection of random candy assortments!!!

It’s kind of a spin on the regular ice cream shop. Firstly, you can choose between 2 «bases,» east-​coast style vanilla custard, or soft serve vanilla ice cream. The next step is choosing a flavor, they offer a good variety, but I chose salted caramel. Third step is a topping to mix in for an additional cost, I chose graham cracker crumbs. Finally, you can dip it in a hard shell, such as caramel, for additional cost as well.
My choice was actually decent, and I believe that this place has potential, but there are a few issues that should be fixed.
— I believe that the price is a bit steep for soft serve ice cream. $ 3.75 for a small soft serve without any additions. I could get the same thing from McDonald’s or Ikea for a buck.
— They don’t use gloves while handling the food. I didn’t see anyone wash their hands between different customers.
— The service was slow. There was one group ahead of us, and between two workers, they still couldn’t get to us for damn near 20 minutes. It’s soft serve… Forgive me but I doubt it should take that long.
Like I said, the place has potential, but there are things to be fixed.

My wife and I went there on 08÷31÷14 to purchase some ice cream before heading to Lake Tahoe.
First, I believe the associates should wear gloves when picking up the cone you are going to serve to your customers. Who does that? If you are not going to wear gloves, make sure there is some sort of paper wrapping around the base of the cone. This will prevent the soft serve ice cream from dripping all over my clothes — like it did soon as I walked out of the store. This is pertaining to the waffle cone. The ice cream was okay. In the end, I believe we will continue to patronize Gunther’s.

East Coast style custard? Yes, please!
For those of you not familiar with custard, it’s basically amazing. You start off with your base of vanilla custard, then you can add on flavors. You can mix your flavors, too! I had banana & chocolate, two flavors that I chose to mix. The possible combinations you can make can be interesting as well. Blueberry bubblegum? Hmmmm. The staff was extremely personable and gave my ice cream right away without me having to pay. I sat on the bar waiting for them to finish making it for me, gave me my ice cream, and said I could pay when I finish. They also were able to accommodate my root beer float needs, either topping it off with more root beer or putting more ice cream to my liking free of charge.
Great concept. Great staff. Now I just need to inhale that candy bar.

This place is good/​average. Reminds me of Bruxie ice cream in Sourhern Cali (but theirs is soooo good). The base can be vanilla or custard and you add flavor and toppings. Kinda expensive. 2 large was $ 15 and that’s with 1 topping for each.

This review is for the cost conscious 99%‘ers. This place is overpriced for the quantity offered. I’m a fan of such places as Foster’s Freeze, one of the original soft serve joints and unlike here they provide a good portion size for what you pay.
Regarding food taste and quality, it was decent but definitely not worth the cost.
Conclusion, avoid if you are at all budget conscious. Besides, there is a Leatherby’s only a couple miles away.

This place is sooo yummy!
I normally get the salted Carmel and it just makes my day!
Everyone here are supper nice. My kids love coming here.

Imagine if your favorite yogurt spot, Coldstone, and The Sweet Factory engaged in a ménage à trois and had a baby.
The baby’s name would be Cleary’s.
If you’re not familiar with this place, here’s a little break down:
First you choose between their vanilla soft serve or their East Coast vanilla custard.
Then you choose what flavor you want your soft serve to be. After that, you can decide on if you want to add a mix-​in and/​or a hard shell.
I sampled the East Coast vanilla custard which was AMAZING by itself. I actually wanted to order it as is, but figured I should try the whole Cleary’s experience since it was my first time there. I went back and forth with all the possible flavor combinations but eventually settled on the mint with brownies and a toasted coconut shell. Coconut shell was good and the mint left your mouth tasting fresh for a while.
My favorite combination was my cousin’s little concoction. He ordered the regular soft serve with amaretto flavor and their cherry hard shell. Tasted like fruity pebbles. B! tches love fruity pebbles. My least favorite was my cousin’s peanut butter. I really like peanut butter anything so I was pretty surprised that I didn’t like it. It sort of tasted like a burnt peanut butter. Maybe it would have tasted better with a mix in or shell.
Friendly staff is always a bonus! Which they totally have. The girls behind the counter were great.

Yummy! My own little heaven in the middle of Loehmans Plaza conveniently located so that I can stop by on my lunch, after work, or pretty much anytime!
Went in a little before 1:00pm on a Wednesday which was definitely a mistake. Anyone who lives or works in the area knows the horrors of parking at Loehmans Plaza at lunchtime and I unfortunately made that mistake! Let me tell you, there is a HUGE different between parking at 12:55 and parking at 1:05.
I finally parked and made it into the store where I was pleasantly surprised to find it not busy at all. Sweet! Half of the store is all about the ice cream and half is all about the candy.
I immediately went to the candy display and started to fill up a bag. Candy is $ 9.99 per pound for the bulk candy and there are other prepackaged candy individually priced. They had over 50 different candy types and selections so I filled my bag with candy blocks, mini charleston chews, chocolate covered gummy bears, gummy bears, chocolate rocks, watermelon barrels, sour pickle barrels, spree, Margherita sours and ginger pineapple chews. I was so excited!
I also got a Small Shake with Vanilla Custard and Espresso (No whip). I found the shake to not be as thick as I usually like, I was able to drink it through a normal straw. The espresso flavor also just tasted like chocolate which was disappointing. Boo.
Overall it’s a great place owned by great people and a welcome addition to Loehmans Plaza. I will definitely be back for someone candy as long as I don’t go during lunch hour!

Omg… Comes to mind when I think about this place! It’s my addiction for when I’m craving something sweet. I adore the Cleary sisters. Cleary’s is this amazing ice cream and candy shop where everyone knows your name.
The east coast vanilla custard is amazing! I’ve done it as an extra thick shake with espresso flavoring mixed in with Heath bar! I swear I died and went to heaven. They have a couple ones they are playing with and today one of my girlfriends and I tried them. Amaze balls!!‘
The candy selection is amazing. They have these chocolate sea salt caramel candy, it’s amazing. They run out of those pretty quickly. A lot of the candy you can’t even get at the sweet factory as I recall I could be wrong. I also think it’s really cool that they have gummy for several local h.s. Gummy Letter plaques that you can purchase.
The customer service is amazing. I have not had bad service yet! Do not walk but sprint over there!

One Word… YUMMY!
The girls working were absolutely great! Superb customer service! Customer Service is key. I am a sucker for excellent customer service.
The ice cream is delicious. Its legitimate creamy perfection. I couldnt get over the creaminess. The flavor selections are out of this world! So glad this place opened!
They have a good selection of candy. Got my smalls a bunch of candy.
I seriously can’t wait to go back! yum yum yum

I’m more of a fan of ice cream and frozen yogurt so this review may be a little biased. Cleary’s is a pretty cool place that opened about two weeks ago in Arden Arcade. I saw it on the new businesses section of Unilocal and scrolled through the pictures, loved what I saw and bookmarked it. I was excited to come here because I’m a huge fan of cutely decorated shops that serve sweets.
Half of the store is dedicated to frozen treats and half of the store is dedicated to candy. You first choose soft serve or custard, and then add in a flavor, toppings and a flavored shell. I ordered the soft serve with maple nut flavor and graham crackers. I also got a bag of mixed candy by the pound and my total was around $ 5 – 6 which I thought was reasonable. I wasn’t a huge fan of the soft serve because it was a little too sweet for my taste and I prefer soft serve that is a little more frozen instead of runny. I did like the selections of candies they had though. I love stores that offer candy by the pound and there was a large variety of candies including some I had never tried before! I will definitely return if I ever get a chance and possibly try the frozen custard instead of the soft serve next time.

Been waiting and waiting for this place to open… and it is finally open! Stopped in to try and out, and its very cute. There’s a counter to sit at, a cool looking menu on the wall, and candy on the back wall. The way the menu works is a little confusing, but once you figure it out, you’re good. They have two «flavors» to start everything out with; soft-​serve vanilla and New England style custard vanilla. From there, you can add flavors and syrups and hard shells. I got a Coke float with soft-​serve and it was great!
The downsides (that I saw): It was really hard to figure out where the line started and in which direction it went. There needs to be some sort of «order here» sign or something. The people in line ahead of us weren’t even sure if they were in line either, so we couldn’t really ask.
The second thing is that the «line» runs right up, and over, the counter where seating is. I’d feel really bad if someone was sitting there and people kept ordering over the top of him/​her.
Overall, great place and I can’t wait to try everything on the menu.

They have all the candy you could ever want. The store is comfortable with a fun atmosphere. They have a special east coast version of frozen custard that is just fantastic. Super creamy and rich it is not the normal icecream that you usually find out here on the west coast. My family loves all the flavor combinations and mix in possibilities. If you like ice cream and candy you will love this place.