Thrifty ice cream-still going strong in SoCal
Any Calif resident pre-1990s surely knows about the legendary Thrifty ice cream and their stands within the Thrifty Drug & Discount Store chain. Thrifty's as everyone called it was ahead of the curve when it came to drug and discount stores carrying a wide variety of merchandise after WW2 that eventually became the staple of the chains such as Walgreen, CVS, Eckerd's, Rite Aid et al
The magical side of Thrifty's was their ice cream, they had a wide variety of flavors and revolving flavors of the month, excellent ice cream that won numerous awards at country and state fairs year after year. Each store had a stand inside selling pre-packaged ice creams by the pint or quart for fast service and a walk up counter where they would serve you an ice cream cone, single, double or triple. They would also hand pack the pints and quarts for take out as well.
Until the early 70's the ice cream was only a nickel a scoop. they used it as a loss leader to bring folks in the stores, in the mid-70s it went up to a dime then in the early 80's 15 cents a scoop. The scoops were different, they were cylindrical shaped, big pellets extracted from the tubs with a pistol type scoop and release.
When the chain of Thrifty Drug & Discount store was sold out to the chain of Rite Aid, the Thrifty ice cream being so imbedded into the culture of Cailfornia, especially its home base of So Cal, that Rite Aid continues having the ice cream stands within Rite Aid stores in Califas and they still use the Thrifty brand for the packaged ice cream as well as the freshly served ice cream cones. The Rite Aid outside of Cali don't have that side to them
By the way, Thrifty's always has used buttercup wafer cones as it complements the cylinder shaped scoops.