When Hannah Twiggs asked last week why Britons will happily pay £5 for an artisan gelato but baulk at £3.50 for a Mr Whippy, Independent readers had plenty to say in defence of the humble 99.

Many argued that gelato has simply been dressed up as luxury – tasteful tubs, provenance and a queue – while soft serve takes the blame for costs it never really controlled: flakes, fuel, insurance and pitch fees among them.

Others widened the debate, tying the reaction to a squeezed cost of living that is pushing spending to two extremes: doing things cheaply yourself, or paying more for something that feels like a proper treat rather than a mid-price compromise.

A few pushed back on the whole premise, arguing that nostalgia is doing most of the heavy lifting in the 99’s defence, and that readers should let their children make their own memories rather than reliving old ones.

Here’s what you had to say:

The soft delight of true luxury

The best gelatos (gelati?) or ‘artisan’ or ‘home-made’ or plain ‘luxury’ ice creams are good and are worth the price. However there are many sub-standard one that are not.

However I still prefer the humble Mr Whippy. I remember in the 1960s when a lot of ice cream came in individually-wrapped blocks that you put into a cornet (or held between two wafers). In those days the soft delight of a Mr Whippy was true luxury.

Gelato is overpriced, not Mr Whippy

Great article. Posh gelato is so overpriced. I’ve seen parents happily hand over £20 for three scoops. You’re right, £3.50 isn’t bad for a Mr Whippy with a flake. It’s more fun than a heaving, gelato shop. And definitely more retro.

Made to order and safer than gelato

Here in the South West a single Mr Whippy in a wafer cone is £1.50, a flake is an extra £1.00 and very good it is too. A woman serving both soft whip ice cream and gelato said that the Mr Whippy was safer as it was made to order and not hanging about being scooped up with a maybe not so clean scoop.

The 99 was never really good value

The 99 has always been overpriced for what it is: soft-serve means you’re buying a lot of air dispensed from a machine into the cheapest cardboard-tasting cone. Something that is incredibly generic, tasting basically the same no matter where you are. Even back when it actually cost 99p the ice-cream itself cost pennies to procure, back then though there were fewer alternatives and the sub-£1 price tag made it sound like good value even though it wasn’t particularly.

Now one of the impacts of stagnating wages and cost of living squeeze is that people have polarised towards either doing things themselves cheaply or spending more on something a bit more special on the basis of “if I’m going to spend money I may as well get something good”.

This isn’t unique to ice cream either. Restaurant chains have been suffering a similar fate. You might pay £15-20 for a Tuscan style pizza from a stone oven but people are increasingly hostile to the idea of spending £12-15 on a Pizza Hut deep pan with those disturbingly uniform lumps of meat. Places that once were packed with families looking to feed five quickly with relative cheapness are now haemorrhaging revenue and closing stores because people would rather either treat themselves to something a bit extra or save money and just grab something out of a supermarket freezer.

In short people with less disposable income are much less inclined to buy mid-quality food.

Waiting for the ice cream van as a child

When I’m out and about, one scoop of rum and raisin ice-cream or mint if they haven’t got the rum. At home I always have Mackies ice cream in the freezer and have cornets and flakes. The ice-cream van is still where it’s at although I only see them at the beach, haven’t heard their tunes around the streets for a while.

On Sundays my Dad used to wait near the window, big bowl in his hands to run out to the ice cream van when it arrived, first sign of the music and off he went. A great treat. True story.

£3.50 is perfectly reasonable

I think ice cream’s pretty boring, I only make it when I’m serving it with a warm dessert but the process of making ice cream which generally involves making a custard is more expensive labour wise and ingredients wise than Mr Whippy which I assume is just some form of whipped sweet milk so £3.50 seems perfectly reasonable, I’m not sure where you’d find one for that in north London, I seem to recall paying that years ago!

Everything costs a fortune nowadays

My children and I love Mr Whippy. Why all the complaints about this in particular, though? Everything costs a fortune in Britain. I bought a cortado today. Despite its exotic sounding name, it is nothing more than a rather delicious small fresh coffee. It was over 4 pounds and yet in Spain these are under 1 pound.

Happy to pay £3.50 for a Mr Whippy

Speak for yourself. I am quite happy to pay £3.50 for a Mr Whippy. In fact I prefer it.

Nostalgia is doing all the work

A 99 is soft ice. How can it ever compare to scoops of flavoured icecream?

The so-called attractiveness of it is nostalgia. Why do you want to force your nostalgia onto your children? Let them make their own childhood memories instead of rehashing yours.

You haven’t taken over your own (grand)parents’ nostalgia for the ‘penny lick’ either have you? Count yourself lucky that you have your own freezer and can buy cheaper ice cream in the supermarket and store it at home. Your parents may not have had that option in their youth and your grandparents definitely hadn’t.

Some of the comments have been edited for this article for brevity and clarity.

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