If you can make it past the ice cream at Tandem Squared (good luck), a sunrise bursting through the mountains says hello. If you want to play, there are plastic containers full of toys, the same setup you’d see in a kindergarten classroom. A couch to the left of the toys offers respite, and a group of moms collapses on it daily, letting out sighs between sips of coffee before their little ones demand something. On one end of the bathroom is a community board where anyone can pin a business card or a scribbled drawing, and on the other end is a collection of Hot Wheels cars.
Cassidy Dellemonache flashes a shy grin before she explains the toy cars. Having Hot Wheels in the bathroom helped spark an interest in the toilet for her two boys during potty training. It’s a little weird and quirky, just like a lot of fun things in life. That’s the point.
“I want to be surrounded by comfort and the things that bring memories of joy,” Dellemonache says. “I want this place to do that for me and for others.”
Indeed, the space is filled with stuffed animals and an overabundance of sweet words—even the Wi-Fi password is “dream big”—meaning you might leave the place with a cavity without even eating the delicious rolled ice cream. Dellemonache knows she overdid it but says her mission is to provide her own little Disneyland in Old Town Fort Collins.
“Someone online said it was cheesy, but I prefer to think of it as whimsical,” she says. “I hope it helps us forget about life outside these walls.”
The ice cream shop is an escape for her and many others, from the moms and downtown characters who appreciate a little cheer to the former addict with suicidal thoughts who checks in with her daily. She employs those who many other places consider unemployable.
Life is hard, she says. She knows that as well as anyone.
Tandem Squared. Photo by Jordan Secher.
Helping others like her
Dellemonache is neurodivergent and has devoted her life to helping others. She has college degrees and 20 years of experience in the field helping those with disabilities find jobs and live full lives. She and her husband, Gabriel Valles, started Tandem Employment Services in 2007 to further her life mission.
“I could figure out people like me,” she says.
Her life experience was more than enough cred. She has autism, a vastly and deeply misunderstood condition, she says. Here’s one of many examples of that: Autistic people are often viewed as aloof, but she says people like her can feel so much that the only way to cope is to take a step back, or disconnect.
Dellemonache is in her late 30s and has already battled breast cancer twice. She has two sons, ages 16 and 7, both of whom are also neurodivergent. She almost died while giving birth to her youngest when her uterus “exploded.” All that trauma left its mark.
She realized she needed another way to help her clients after she had a couple of outbursts at work. She was increasingly frustrated with what she perceived as society’s unwillingness to help her clients find jobs.
“Every business should be doing this,” Dellemonache says. “We shouldn’t be the only place. People with emotional and intellectual disabilities and the neurodivergent can work anywhere. I’m a good example.”
She wasn’t fired because she owns the company, but her husband gently suggested she step down. She opened the ice cream shop in October and called it Tandem Squared because it essentially has the same goal as Tandem Employment Services. But it’s a more direct way to help, which is exactly what she needed.
Tandem Squared is more than just an ice cream shop. It’s a model. Dellemonache employs neurodivergent people and others with intellectual disabilities to prove that it’s possible. It’s her way of showing other business owners how it’s done.
Cassidy Dellemonache rolling ice cream. Photo by Jordan Secher.
A frozen delicacy
Dellemonache serves rolled ice cream because it helps her stand out. It’s a business, after all, and she needs customers. She also prefers it. She talks about it the way a sommelier speaks about wine. She believes the sensory experience rolled ice cream provides, from its beauty to its texture and taste, is superior to scooped ice cream. She also chose it, she says bluntly, because it’s easy to teach.
“It looks hard to do, and it’s not,” she says. “It’s so simple, and the confidence they get from doing it, from doing meaningful work, is amazing.”
She has to support her employees a bit more because of their conditions, but not too much more. It annoys her when people think they have to coddle them. That isn’t true. She and her husband refer to themselves as “assistants” to their employees, in part to prove that point.
“Many people in the world have the same support systems, but they just pay for them, like a secretary or assistant, to help them with their schedules or do tasks,” she says. “What we do is not that much different.”
Jamie Coble came from Dellemonache’s employment agency and has worked as her assistant manager since Tandem Squared opened. She has cognitive disabilities as a result of fetal alcohol syndrome. Her specialty, she says, is customer service. She enjoys talking to people.
“I love it. It gives me a lot of opportunities I never thought I could have,” Coble says. “When I was younger, people told me what I wouldn’t be and I wouldn’t succeed. But you know what? I am right now.”
Dellemonache hopes to provide a place where people like her can work for years, but she is already worried about the future. When something goes wrong, her husband fixes it, she says, because repairs are expensive.
“We are just normal people,” she says. “We aren’t trust fund babies. There’s no money in this.”
Instead there is community, comfort and, of course, ice cream. There’s one more reason Dellemonache prefers rolled ice cream: It’s unique, she says, just like her and the people she serves.
