Yogurt shop inspired by Alabama store

Chad Turner, left, of Atlanta, Ga., and Joanna Futrell, of Bowling Green, top their frozen yogurt with toppings at Stakz. Stakz is a new frozen yogurt store on Scottsville Road, which offers 12 varieties of yogurt and over 50 toppings. LANCE BOOTH/HERALD

Cristen Friddell

Stakz Self-Serve Frozen Yogurt got its name from the verb which best describes the store.

“Stakz,” Owner Kathy Higgins said with a laugh. “You can stack on a little, or you can stack on a lot.”

The store is located on 1945 Scottsville Road in the Thoroughbred Shopping Center behind Rafferty’s.

The store opened last month, and Higgins said she has been amazed at how busy it’s been.

“We have only been open two weeks,” said Stakz employee Clay Jernigan, Bowling Green High School senior. “And we haven’t had a slow day.”

Higgins owns and runs the store with help from her husband, Fred, and friends Beth and Brooks Clark.

The four friends got the idea for Stakz from a similar store they visited in Birmingham, Ala., named Yogurt Mountain.

“We just had to open one,” she said. “It was such a fun place.”

Stakz offers a selection of 12 flavors of frozen yogurt such as sorbet and tart.

Every week they swap out one of their flavors for a new one, Higgins said.

This week’s flavor is Snickerdoodle, a flavor modeled after the cookie.

The future lineup includes cheesecake frozen yogurt and pink lemonade sorbet, she said.

And with the fall season approaching, flavors like pumpkin are being added to the list of flavors, Jernigan said.

The shop also provides 50 toppings and fresh fruits for the customer to stack on the yogurt.

“It’s neat because the customer has control,” Higgins said. “It’s fun to see what they create.”

Prices are based on weight, at 45 cents an ounce, Jernigan said.

Higgins said her goal was to provide not only a delicious snack, but a healthy one as well.

“All our yogurts have live and active cultures,” Higgins said. “All of them are low fat or no fat.”

Yogurt products with live and active cultures are not pasteurized, meaning they have immune boosting and heart healthy benefits, according to the National Yogurt Association’s website.

She said the tart yogurt is especially healthy, even though the taste may take some getting used to.

“But if you add some fresh fruit,” Higgins said, “yum!”

Both Higgins and Brooks Clark are WKU graduates.

Higgins said she wants to give back to WKU students, possibly through discounts or college nights in the future.

Brittney Grant, a senior from Blairsville, Ga., who has been working at Stakz since it opened, said the store has had a lot of business from WKU students.

“The Alpha Delta Pi sorority came in for a yogurt night,” she said.

Store hours are from 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. on Monday through Thursday, 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. on Friday and Saturday and 12 p.m. to 8 p.m. on Sunday.