The romance of Papalani Gelato began over 20 years ago when another romance blossomed between the company’s future owners, Lauren and Marck Shipley.
The Shipley’s first met in Hawaii in 1985 when Marck walked into Lauren’s shared house. Soon, Lauren would leave Hawaii and her career as a gemologist to join Marck in the Bay Area, where he was as an executive in the high-tech industry of Silicon Valley.
A three-week trip to Italy almost 15 years ago sparked the Shipley’s love affair with gelato. Traveling with their two children, Lauren and Marckwere enchanted by the Italian practice of on-site, artisan food production. Each gelato shop made its own gelato, and each was slightly different in taste, texture and quality. Although they didn’t know at the time what a huge part gelato would play in their future, the Shipley’s were hooked.
Marck and Lauren discovered Canada’s idyllic Salt Spring Island when they decided they had enough of the high-tech world and wished to find a simpler environment to raise their children. Touring the island over Valentine’s Day weekend 2002, they found both a home and a retail business they could run together. The couple decided to add gelato to the retail shop, and began making it themselves in small batches at the rear of the store.
Since introducing homemade gelato to Salt Spring Island in November 2003, the Shipley’s have watched their passion grow into their biggest success. Salt Spring Gelato is now produced in a new facility and is wholesaled to fine restaurants, retailers, and hotels on- and off-island. The company is the first in Canada to make organic gelato. Using locally produced organic milk and a high percentage of locally made ingredients, these business choices reflect the Shipley’s commitment to create a small ecological footprint and support local economies.
Coming full circle, the Shipley’s opened Papalani Gelato, a gelato and confections store on the island of Kauai, in the state of Hawaii where their romance first began. For the couple, who loves fine chocolate and gelato, their life couldn’t be sweeter.
Now their journey continues as they have decided to Franchise their Papalani Gelato Concept throughout the state of Hawaii and perhaps to other places where people who want to own a piece of paradise where they may live.
