Our crew is friendly, efficient, fluent in dozens of languages, can text message with one hand, are experts at Sudoku, have hundreds of friends in their FaceBook pages, are capable of performing complex trigonometry problems in their heads (while completing the Sunday Times crossword), are artistically gifted, have perfect pitch, knows the capitol of every state, is uncommonly attractive, has the coolest music in their iPods, throws a nasty curve ball, has an unusually appealing sense of humor, are always the ninth caller, can do the hippest new dance steps while scooping cones, are well informed on world events, a little bit zany, and a lot of fun to be a part of! We might be exaggerating just a little bit there, but we're extremely proud of our team, and of the amazing job they do in serving our customers and making our store a fun, friendly place to visit.

We have many of our team from the 2010 season who we're hoping will be back for the 2011 season. But with school commitments and competition from other employers looking to hire great workers, we know that we'll probably lose a few of them. Those spots are always much sought after (hey, how many jobs actually encourage you to eat ice cream?), and we're very selective in adding team members.

The best way to get in line for one of these potential spots is to contact us early! We go through applications in the order we receive them when we're looking for candidates to interview, so getting your application in early gives you a head start. We do most of our hiring in February, March, and April, and in past years, the majority of our open slots have been filled by early April. We have had a lot of great candidates come to the stand in mid-June over the last few years who we had to turn away as we already had a full team.

We also give extra points to those recommended by someone already on our team. Again, we love our current team, and always ask their opinions on applicants they might know through school, sports, or other activities. So if you're friendly with one of our team, ask them if they'd sponsor your application. (They get a bonus for bringing in good team members too.)

Our preference is to hire only those who will be with us through Labor Day as new team members, so if you're a high school Senior who'll be leaving for college in August, you'll have to really wow us to make the team. (So you underclassmen, take heart and don't be afraid to apply!) We really target those completing their Sophomore year of high school as our ideal candidates.

If you don't know anyone on our team, you can either email us, or come on by the store, ask for Steve, introduce yourself and tell me why you think you'd make a great addition to our team. I've hired several kids who impressed me by simply selling themselves with a positive, eager, outgoing personality.

If you think you'd enjoy being part of our team, we'd love to hear from you, so

Before you apply though, a few points to consider:

One of my pet peeves when patronizing other area businesses, is to pay for something, and to have the change dropped on the counter without so much as a "Thanks". I believe that folks are doing us an enormous favor by choosing our store over the others available, and that thanking them for visiting us is the least we can do. Therefore, we put a huge emphasis on hiring people with exceptional manners. We stress this in our training -- every customer gets a friendly greeting when they arrive and a thank you with their change.

We look for outgoing, friendly personalities, so if you aren't prepared to slip out of the role of the typical disinterested, non-engaging Gen-Y2Ker, you probably won't enjoy working for us. (You can transition back to into that mode when you're at home, around your parents! ;^)

If you come by our store and watch the way our team interacts with our customers, I think you'll see that we're doing a pretty good job. We're extremely proud when we get complimented on the courtesy and friendliness of our team. We've got a great crew, and we love every one of them!

As I've emphasized above, we also have a team of what I like to describe as "good people". There's no one on the team who I don't personally enjoy being around and trust to do what's best for our business, and I want to keep it that way. Our crew seems to genuinely enjoy working together, and I want them to be happy with the "new kids", thus I often ask one or two of them to participate in the interviewing process. So, although I reserve the final veto authority on new hires, the real decision on whom to hire comes from them.

A couple of other things to consider:

• Scooping ice cream looks like fun from the customer side of the counter, but believe us, it's hard work! It can get hot in the store, scooping takes a bit of physical strength as well as a lot of mental awareness to interact with the customers, prepare their order efficiently, and work together well with the other team members. Plus, we inevitably get sticky from handing the scoops and moving empty tubs around, so it can be a bit messy. And, you need to really enjoy interacting with people, as that's a big part of the job.
• The majority of our business is on weeknights, after 6pm, and on weekends, especially weekend nights, so those are the times when we need people to be available to work. If you often go away with family or friends on summer weekends, you're going to have to explain to us how you're going to fit work into that schedule (and that'll be a really hard sell.)

Our hiring rules:

1. You have to be at least 14 years old (but we will only hire one or two this young, as those under 16 can work only limited hours due to Massachusetts Labor Law.)
2. If under 18 years old, you'll need your parents' approval to apply for the job.
3. If under 18, you'll need to obtain a working permit from your school superintendent once you're offered a position.
4. You need to be available for at least one day, one weeknight, and one weekend night shift each and every week throughout the summer.
5. You need to commit to being available to work during the four spring/summer holiday weekends (Patriot's Day, Memorial Day, July 4th, and Labor Day).
6. There is no rule #6.
7. You need to commit to staying with us through September, unless you specifically tell us otherwise during the interview process.
8. You need to love interacting with people and eating ice cream!

So, having read all of that, do you still think you'd like to work with us? Great! Send us a completed application! You can download an electronic copy right here ( Open Office format  |  MS-Word format  |  PDF ) and either send it to us by email or print it out and mail it to us (1025 Osgood Street, North Andover, MA 01845). Or even just drop it off at the store. We'll send you a response and contact you if we want to set up a face-to-face interview. If you don't have a printer, you can email me and ask me to mail a hardcopy to you, or come by the store and ask one of our team if we could print one out for you.

Do's and Don'ts

Here are couple of final hints from Steve that can help make you stand out (What other business gives you a cheat sheet to help you get a job?):

Do:

• Make sure you can commit to being available for night and weekend shifts every week of the summer.
• Make yourself standout from the dozens of other applicants by being friendly and making eye contact.
• Say hi every time you visit the stand, so we remember you.
• Show us that you're outgoing and polite.
• Introduce us to your parents, if they're with you.

Don't:

• Tell us you want to work here because it looks like an easy job, or because you like to eat ice cream.
• Send a parent in to get the application for you.
• Stand silently while your parent talks to us about hiring you.
• Tell us you can't work weekends.
• Say that you don't know how many hours you'd like to work weekly.
• Tell us you can only work for us during times when your other job doesn't need you.