Big Gay Ice Cream Ousted From UWS Outpost, Records Show

UPPER WEST SIDE, NY — The landlords did not have a sweet spot for Big Gay Ice Cream.

Big Gay Ice Cream has been evicted from its Upper West Side storefront at 516 Columbus Ave. on the corner of West 85th Street, court records show and a notice on the front door confirms.

The store was closed this weekend and a note on the window from the city's Marshal office read, "The landlord has legal possession of these premises pursuant to warrant of civil court."

Big Gay Ice Cream did not immediately respond to Patch's request for comment.

A New York Supreme Civil Court judge ruled in favor of evicting the ice cream shop owners — who do business as Big Gay Agenda LLC — on Valentine's Day, Feb. 14, court records show.

Landlords 509 Columbus Properties LLC filed a complaint in May 2021 alleging Big Gay Ice Cream owed nearly $250,000 in unpaid rent, court records show.

The closure comes four years after the ice cream business signed a 10-year lease for the Upper West Side location in 2018, court documents show.

The store did not open until 2020, though, as rent disputes began as early as December 2019, records show.

Big Gay Ice Cream — which began in a truck — still has two locations open in the city, inside Madison Square Garden and at the South Street Seaport.

But the Upper West Side closure follows that of its original East Village location in early 2021, after more than 10 years of serving customers at the shop.

"Empty storefronts, the result of both rising rents and the COVID-19 pandemic, have settled in," the owners of Big Gay Ice Cream wrote on Facebook at the time of the closing.

"Many great businesses have closed. It ain’t what it was."