Tuesday, July 10, 2012

Upgrading of Kimball Farms: New Ideas, New Places


This is the New England staple of ice cream, grill shack, and golf-themed activities...well, mostly.  In Westford, where the headquarters are, is where all the activities.  The three other locations are in Carlisle, which is an ice-cream only place, and the one in Lancaster and Jaffery, where it's Ice Cream, grille, and a country store.  The country store in Jaffery is smaller and is mostly a gift shop.
Now, Kimball is turning 75 years old come 2014, here are changes I would like.

1: Opening of two new locations: one, either in 2 school street in Framingham, where that ugly remnents of a former lumber site, in which it's an eye sore in the area, especially where the northern terminus of the Cochituate Rail Trail, or one near the route 30-speen street intersection.  If it's in school street, that place makes a great spot for an ice cream/restaurant/country store place, similer to what's in Jaffery New Hampsire.  If's it in the route 30 intersection, an ice-cream/grill would be ideal.  The other place would be in boston, at the Prudental Center, at the North End, or at the Quincy Market.  Therefore, Bostonians don't need to have a car and drive far to enjoy the ice cream.

2: Turn the grill and seafood shack at the Westford Location to a full fledge casual restaurant.  As well as hamburgers and Lobster rolls, combine that with the soup and sandwich shop, and even serve full breakfast in the morning, like pancakes, waffles, omlets, and french toast.  For lunch, add steak, beef and polled pork/chicken platters. grilled salmon, even pizza.  As far as the tents go, replace those with a more permenent house-like building that goes together with the other structures and the farmhouse, with indoor seating for the winter as well as outdoor seating.

3: Expand the bakery in the country store to include gormet cakes, tarts, and an assortment of peanut butter brownies and more.

4: Add a mini golf and driving range at the Lancaster location.

5: Add a self serve soft-serve dessert section especially in the Westford section.  A new trend of self-serve frozen yogurt is beginning to make Kimball Farm look dated, thanks to the incredible customer flexibility that these new concept of stores that have opened up.  By doing self-serve soft serve, the amount of flavers can explode.  Basically, how it works is you grab a cup of any size (small cup or a large cup) or a fiber plate, get a brownie and/or a banana if you want, go up to the ice cream/yogurt dispensers and dispense yourself the ice cream, add the toppings and the fudge/peanut butter, weigh it, and pay.  This place can be located right near the ice cream windows.

6: Serve ice cream year-round, especially at the Westford and Lancaster locations.  Bring the ice cream into the restaurant (in Westford), and the country store (in Lancaster) in the winter.  Oh, by the way, open the country store year-round in Lancaster and the restaurant in Westford year-round.  Have some more seasonal ice cream, like Valentines Dark Chocolate Cherry for Valentines day, Shamrock Green Mint for St. Patrick's Day, Egg Nog for Thanksgiving and Christmas, Candy Cane Mint for Christmas, and New Year's Confetti Ice Cream for New Years Day.

7: The Olde Sawmill Arcade in Westford was once great back in 2010, but it's quickly becomming dated and the tent structure just doesn't fit in well with the gaming.  In fact, the only thing that's worth playing at this is that shooting game.  But alas, I even think sometimes that 2010 is a little late.  What they should do is replace a lot of the games with lazer tag and other 21st century stuff here.

The other thing that I would like to see changed is the fact that when you order a small, you should have at least two choices of flavers, as well as 3 for a large.

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