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Why Is Tyra Banks Running An Ice-Cream Shop At Washington DC? Everything To Know About Her Venture
The Victoria’s Secret model and America’s Next Top Model host Tyra Banks is into ice cream business now. Check out how and why.
Global icon and former top model Tyra Banks is implementing her modeling tips into making ice cream and serving it in Washington, DC. Following her decades-long career on runways and as the host of America’s Next Top Model, the 50-year-old actor, writer, and producer has just inaugurated her new pop-up ice cream in Woodley Park.
Hundreds line up on Friday (July 19) to get free ice cream and a glimpse of the owner at the new Smize & Dream ice cream shop, which is going to run till September 20. The first 202 customers were to get free ice cream because that's the city's area code.
From why she chose such a venture and its location to the meaning behind its name and business plan, here’s everything you need to know about Banks’s ice cream shop.
How did Smize & Dream come into existence, and why Washington, DC?
Banks started Smize & Dream during the COVID-19 pandemic and initially sold prepackaged pints in Los Angeles in 2021. Following this, she opened a pop-up “ice cream trunk” in Dubai last year.
This, in Washington, DC, is her first physical brick-and-mortar ice cream parlor with walls in the United States, but her team says the business will soon be expanding to Australia and other countries.
Despite Washington, DC, not really being popular for entertainment or off-brand start-ups, Banks chose this city because it is her brother Devin’s home. He is a 28-year-old Air Force veteran currently working on Capitol Hill. Banks said in an interview with the Washington Post that they have been in different parts of the world for decades, “so it’s nice to be here with him.”
Another major reason for choosing the city is the “Dream” part of the venture’s name.
What is the meaning of Smize & Dream?
The expression “smiling with your eyes,” coined by Tyra Banks in 2009 and frequently used as advice to contestants on America’s Next Top Model, is encapsulated in the term “Smize.” The name “Dream” represents the charitable aspect of her enterprise.
According to Banks, the company is dedicated in many ways to her mother, Carolyn, with whom she had weekly Häagen-Dazs scoops, a childhood favorite, when they were younger. She further shared that her mother had to work two jobs to pay for the relocation from a one-bedroom apartment in Los Angeles.
The “Dream” segment of the initiative is focused on establishing an educational facility in Washington, D.C., aimed at teaching young people about hospitality entrepreneurship. The business plans to invest in D.C.'s culinary education by opening a nonprofit ice cream and entrepreneurial center. This center will educate underprivileged youth about the science of selling ice cream and various roles in the hospitality sector. The decision to launch the pop-up in D.C. was influenced by the intention to collaborate with local businesses and government institutions before expanding globally.
One of the photo booths at the shop reads, “Never too old to dream. Never too young to smize.”
What makes Smize & Dream unique?
To avoid getting overwhelmed by the wall of flavor options at most ice cream parlors, Banks has created “flavor zones” at Smize & Dream. First in the zone is "comfort,” with flavors like classic vanilla and rich Chocolate GooGoo Cake containing pudding-infused lava cake pieces, which Banks calls “taste like childhood.”
Second in the zone is "curious,” with flavors including StrawNana Pudding and Purple Cookie Mon-Star. And lastly, there’s a “crazy” zone that is full of experimental flavors with a touch of the locale, such as Cap Hill Crunch filled with Cap’n Crunch cereal ice cream with toffee, Cap’n Crunch-encrusted French toast, Woodley Park Thang, which is a lemon ice cream with shortbread cookies and blueberry jam, and the only vegan flavor: Chocolate Cookies and Cream made with coconut and cashew milks.
Another unique feature of Smize & Dream is its “smize surprize,” which is a replacement for the common toppings because Banks thinks “our flavors can’t be topped.” So, instead of toppings, each order comes with a surprise truffle hidden at the bottom of the cup or cone. The options include Chocolate Fudge Brownie covered in dark chocolate with sparkly purple sugar; Cookie Butta dipped in semisweet chocolate and rolled in crushed Biscoff cookie, or the weekly rotating truffle.
“When I came up with the idea for this business, I was like, ‘How can I represent what my mom stands for in dreams and working hard to make her dreams the truth?’” Banks says. “And that’s when I came up with 'smize surprize.’ So when you’re digging, think about your dream—not weight loss—and where that comes from,” said Banks.
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