For the last three years, Rebecca Davis has been sharing her love for Hawaiian shave ice with Birmingham through Ono Ice, a pop-up stand that Davis can set up at local businesses and events. Now, Davis is hoping for a chance to go mobile and reach even more potential customers by purchasing a truck for Ono Ice. She’s raising funds with a Kickstarter campaign that launched Friday, July 24 and will end on Sunday, Aug. 23 at 10 p.m.
Throughout the campaign, Davis has held events throughout the city at popular locations such as Good People Brewing Company and Rojo. Davis will host the campaign’s last event this Friday, Aug. 21, at Saturn. Local shoegaze band Wray will DJ the event. The event will also feature a giveaway with prizes such as Sidewalk Film Festival day passes and yearlong passes for shows at Saturn.
For Davis, shave ice is not just a hobby. She feels strongly about this city, she says, and loves being a part of the progressive movement of Birmingham. She might feel just as strongly about shave ice.
“This is deep-rooted,” Davis said. “If you go to my old MySpace page, you see shave ice is one of the interests on my profile.”
Now, with the deadline looming in the near future, she is nervous but still hopeful.
“I ain’t going down without a fight,” she said.
Davis left Birmingham and lived in Los Angeles and Minneapolis for 10 years, and she would make a point to get a shave ice every time she came home after never being able to find the treat in Minneaopolis. Davis visited Birmingham again in 2006, and decided to stay after seeing the positive changes happening within the city.
“When I came back, I saw this big creative community that I didn’t know existed before. All this cool stuff started happening. It felt like it was the best time to be in Birmingham because it was right at the beginning, and I wanted to help make it a better place,” Davis explained.
Within that frame of mind, Davis started working at the Bottletree Café as a promotions assistant. There, she formed a strong network of friends that would later support her and her endeavors with Ono Ice.
With Ono Ice, Davis hopes to create her own niche in Birmingham’s food scene. She creates unique syrups — with flavors such as lavender peach or pineapple jalapeño — made from scratch with fresh ingredients. Davis also has seasonal flavors with ingredients including peppermint, eggnog and apple cider.
When Davis started, there were not many recipes for fresh syrups online, but she felt that the concept had to originate with real fruit. After researching, she discovered the long history of shave ice and its traditional use of fresh ingredients. Davis explains that the shave ice dessert originated in Japan and became known worldwide after Japanese plantation workers immigrated to Hawaii.
“Knowing the history, I knew I could make it work with real fruit,” Davis said. “I don’t know why [shave ice] got so far away from that, but I want to try to bring back fresh fruits and ingredients.”
This focus on freshness takes hours of preparation, Davis says. Preparing for an event can take 10 hours, including shopping, chopping fruit or juicing.
It’s no surprise, then, that Ono Ice started off slowly. Davis tested the idea out at a craft bazaar at Bottletree three years ago, and then again three months later. It was a struggle in the early stages, she says.
“The first year, people didn’t know what to make of it, and people didn’t know what to make of the weird flavors,” she said. “People weren’t used to the all-natural approach so I had to be in their faces. I got mixed reviews because it wasn’t the bright artificial colors they were used to.”
However, Davis’s business has started to accelerate over the last couple of years, particularly at Birmingham festivals — Happenin Fest, High Five Fest and the Sidewalk Film Festival. She also has started catering private events including weddings and birthday parties.
“I started out not knowing what to expect and not knowing how well it [would] be received,” Davis said. “It’s all been word-of-mouth at this point and trying to build it up. And now I want to make it into a business. I know this seems like just another business to some people, but it’s more than that. It’s a belief that we can live in this town, have our crazy ideas, follow our dreams and make Birmingham an awesome place to live.”
Right now, Davis has a manual ice block shaver that she can set up at different locations. If her Kickstarter is a success, she will be able to buy a truck along with an electric ice shaver. Also she will be able to legitimize her business with permits allowing her to set up shop in different locations throughout the city. Ono Ice will be able to travel to more places, and she will have the equipment to work with bigger festivals and events, she says.
“I will be able to reach more people and more places,” Davis said. “The Kickstarter was my best option, but if I don’t make my goal then I don’t get any of the money and that’s scary as hell.”
Davis is hoping to raise $24,000, and her benefit events have brought more awareness to her Kickstarter. Travis Swinford, guitarist and singer for local band Plains, performed at the first benefit event held at Good People and says he was excited to help Davis’s cause.
“A party like [that] one shows how people with different talents come together to support each other, creating a lively, diverse local flavor,” Swinford said. “I’ve seen Rebecca sling shaved ice at street markets, outside coffee shops, at D.I.Y. music shows and more. She’s worked really hard for her business and I’m proud that Plains gets to help out in our own little rock’n’roll way.”
The Aug. 21 Ono Ice event at Saturn will begin at 9 p.m. and is free. For more information on the event, visit saturnbirmingham.com. For more information on the Kickstarter campaign, visit kickstarter.com/projects/onoicetruck/ono-ice-all-natural-shave-ice-truck.