A cheeky logo of a cartoon cow has sparked a beef between a derrière-themed ice cream shop and residents who say the image is sexist.

Complaints against the newly opened Dairy Air Ice Cream Co. began Monday with an open letter by local business owner Amy Tingle, who blasted the store for sexualizing women to sell ice cream and demanded that the logo be put out to pasture.

“It is offensive and sickening,” Tingle wrote. “A hyper-sexualized, obviously female cow with her ass upended and poking through a circle, tail raised up, waiting for what? I'm not sure, but I do know that I am repulsed and offended.”

The logo is not visible from the store’s exterior but is plastered on the store’s furniture, walls and cups, making girls and women feel “as if we are things for someone else’s sexual use,” Tingle wrote.

Anthony Tortoriello, owner of Dairy Air Ice Cream, could not be reached for comment. The store’s online presence had been wiped by Wednesday and its Instagram page set to private.

Maya Stein, Tingle’s business and life partner, said Tortoriello stopped by their business, Creativity Caravan, on Monday but disputed that the logo was sexualized.

"The owner said it's not what he intended," Stein said. "But there's a responsibility as a business owner that extends beyond your person. OK it’s a funny joke, but now you're making it a business and now all of your signage revolves around this very adolescent communication. Is that what you want? Is that the imprint you want to make on the community? Maybe it is but it comes at a price of seriously offending people."

Natalie DeRosa, the ice cream store’s manager, has also met with Stein and Tingle and extended an olive branch, writing on Facebook: “We have heard the complaints. We take them very seriously and we are acting to change the cow to be more fun and less sexy. Our goal was always fun and not sexy.”

After ongoing controversy both locally and nationally, the Dairy Air Ice Cream Co. has agreed to modify its mascot. In a press release from Thursday, franchise co-owner Anthony Tortoriello explained that he and his business partner Jeff O’Neill have spoken with others and understand why the logo needs to change.

“Dairy Air was created with one goal in mind—to make delicious dairy desserts for our customers,” he said, according to a press release. “To us, it’s all about the ice cream and serving it in a super unique, family-friendly store, with awesome customer service. We simply created a fun illustration to complement our fun name. In ‘hindsight,’ however, we realize that the illustration may have been offensive to some. In light of that, we are working now to tweak it.”

The store’s owners went on to explain that Dairy Air’s ice cream, not its sexy cow, is meant to be the store’s true appeal.

“As for our product, we think that utterly speaks for itself,” O’Neill said.

Dairy Air, a Montclair ice cream shop that opened a year ago to a firestorm about its "sexualized" logo, has closed, and its owner is blaming "extremist radical liberals" for his business's demise.

Owner Anthony Tortoriello had harsh words for the locals who called the cow's-rump logo “offensive and sickening" and hosted a community meeting about the matter.

"They were on a crusade to destroy my business and my life," said Tortoriello, who added that he is fed up and retiring from business. "I was totally berated and accused of being a woman-hater. It was nonstop harassment; it never ended."
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The logo that caused the ruckus — a cow with blonde pigtails, a beret and a tattoo on its bare, upturned rump — was never changed, despite Tortoriello's stated intention to alter it in the wake of the uproar. Tortoriello defended the logo in a December 2017 press release, saying, “We simply created a fun illustration to complement our fun name,” while saying he nevertheless was working on a new logo.
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Tingle, who declined to "resurrect the controversy or address any grievances that arose because of it," did suggest in a statement that Dairy Air's closing likely had more to do with high overhead than the dust-up over the logo.

Tortoriello met with Tingle, contending the logo was meant to be fun, not offensive. The shop also promised that it would change the logo after customers and community members complained. But the change never happened.

As of Tuesday, the phone at the business had been disconnected. Tortoriello could not be reached for comment.