The Levee Creamery in Collierville, which opened at 2059 S. Houston Levee Road in May, is marrying two locally produced delights that work wonderfully together: ice cream and fresh roasted coffee.
Pyro’s Fire Fresh Pizza co-owners Chad Foreman and Kirk Cotham were wanting to do something different for the community they live in and jumped at the chance when the former TCBY location came available.
The business partners, who operate five Pyro’s pizza locations locally and are expanding into the southeast U.S., both live within walking distance of their new creamery.
“We had a vision to turn into a cool, unique coffee/ice cream shop opening every morning at 6:30 and staying open until 10 (p.m.),” said Foreman.
“So in the morning, it’s a really great coffee hangout and you can get coffee all day, but in the afternoons it turns into a great hangout for kids where we make the ice cream in-house – kind of a super-premium ice cream that we are making right here in Collierville.”
The most popular flavor is Mustang Madness (Oreo cookie and vanilla), with Mint To Be (mint with chocolate flakes), Grit and Grind Café (coffee), Birthday Bash, vanilla, and Mud Island (chocolate) close behind.
“We have about 22 different flavors right now that we make on a regular basis, and we have 16 in the cabinet at any one time,” said Foreman. “And we’re constantly developing new things, and we’ll put those out as a beta.”
The creamery’s coffee comes locally from French Truck, which was formerly Relevant Roasters.
“Everything we get is roasted in their facility,” said Foreman. “Usually we receive it within 48 hours of them roasting it. We let it age a couple of days and then we’re able to serve it. So it‘s probably some of freshest roasted coffee you can get.”
He touts the fact that the shop has already converted many people to cold-brew coffee beverages with its Oji water dripper system.
“It’s off the charts, I can’t count how many people we converted to the Oji cold brew because of the smoothness of that coffee,” said Foreman.
With the ongoing expansion of Pyro’s into Mississippi and Alabama, the focus is not on expanding with more creameries just yet, but Foreman is not ruling out chances to be opportunistic in the future.
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