Ice Pinkie pro shop, located inside the Lexington Ice Center, serves skaters of all ages and abilities. “I want people to tell stories years from now about their first pair of skates,” said owner June Warta.
Known as “the biggest little pro shop in Kentucky,” Ice Pinkie is located inside the Lexington Ice Center on Eureka Springs Drive. A small business in the truest sense of the word, Ice Pinkie is less than 100-square-feet. From those cozy confines, owner June Warta sells skates, colorful blade covers, clothing, and ice-skating gear and accessories.
Originally from Scotland, Warta visited her first ice rink in Aberdeen at age 6 and saw an experienced skater soaring while doing the splits. “I remember looking up — she was above my head, it seemed — and it was at that very moment that I fell in love with the ice,” Warta said. “It was as if my soul was awakened to my future and destiny; it was one of the most important split seconds of my life.”
Warta was an ice-skating coach and eventually a director with the Ice Skating Institute of America and for the United States Figure Skating’s “Learn to Skate USA” program. Growing up, she moved quite a few times across Europe and Canada, staying involved in ice sports all the while. She was a young teen when she landed in America in 1976 and spent the next 28 years living in Alaska.
Ice Pinkie owner June Warta, center, became enamored with skating as a child. She is a former director of the Ice Skating Institute of America and of the United States Figure Skating’s “Learn to Skate USA” program.
Warta moved to Lexington in 2003, and within two years, she was named director of the Lexington Skating Academy, a program that still operates within the Lexington Ice Center. In 2011 she was presented with the opportunity to take over the pro shop in the lobby.
“I knew nothing about wholesale products, retail, sales tax, or Slatwall fixtures and had never touched a cash register,” she said. “All I had was an unfinished B.A. in business marketing from Alaska Pacific University and years of unperfected skating skills. My biggest asset was resilience, a trait I learned over the years.”
Ice Pinkie began as a partnership, but soon Warta was the sole owner of A Skate of Mind, doing business as Ice Pinkie. Competing with online companies for retail skates was frustrating. “A battle I couldn’t win with my limited computer skills and budget,” she said. Warta discovered she could, however, compete best with one-on-one, in-person sales, offering advice and superb fitting services along with retail orders. “I began to focus less on conquering the online world and move toward serving the face-to-face customer,” she said.
She ran the Ice Pinkie store, coached ice-skating students and managed the Lexington Skating Academy. At times it was overwhelming to have three paying jobs under one roof, she said, but each time she thought about closing the shop she found the will to stay with it.
And then the pandemic brought about a considerable interest in skating. “Easy, breezy outdoor fun was in style,” Warta said. “While everything else was shutting down, outdoor rinks flourished, and the ice-skating industry ran out of recreational skates.”
Product lines dried up while the factories were closed, and Ice Pinkie had no new products to sell. Warta refocused her attention on procuring used skates for recycling and resale to stay afloat. “It was another reminder of my first pair of rusty blades,” she said, “but new or used, it is my job to bring joy.”
The product lines of skates and equipment are back, and for the first time since it opened in 2011, Ice Pinkie will remain open throughout the summer.
She sees Ice Pinkie as a service to the community of Lexington, a support store for the faces she sees each week and for those who will come in seeking to get started in the sport.
“Life did not bring me glorious moments on a podium that I dreamed of, but I have been elevated so much higher,” Warta said. “When I sell a pair of skates, I am selling a story. I want people to tell stories years from now about their first pair of skates.”