Marble Slab Creamery

The Marble Slab Creamery sensory experience begins when you walk past the storefront, where the buttery aroma of fresh-baked waffle cones drifts into the air. Gourmet ice creams are freshly crafted onsite from Marble Slab’s original recipe, enticing customer's eyes with a rainbow of colors. Once clients have made a flavor selection, they choose from a smorgasbord of mix-ins, from fresh fruit to nuts to candy and crumbled cookies. An ice cream chef then folds those in atop a frosty marble slab before packing the finished masterpiece into one of those delirium-inducing waffle cones.

In addition to whipping up handheld treats, Marble Slab Creamery sends creations home in the form of ice cream cakes, cupcakes, and hand-packed quarts. It also has catering teams that spruce up special events like corporate get-togethers and school functions with build-your-own sundae bars.

Great American Cookies

Armed with just a single, generations-old cookie recipe, Great American Cookies opened its first store in 1977, and the rest is history. Today, the franchise boasts locations in malls across the country and nabbed a coveted spot on Entrepreneur magazine’s 2012 Top 500 Franchises in the baked-goods category. As the shop’s reputation grew, so did its menu as chefs churned out a mouthwatering roster of gourmet-cookie recipes, each created and carefully tested in Atlanta. The tempting options now include snickerdoodle, peanut butter with M&Ms, and pecan supreme, as well as freshly baked fudge and cheesecake brownies, and cookie sandwiches stuffed with frosting. The real show-stoppers, however, are the giant chocolate-chip cookie cakes, which can be customized with sweet, celebratory messages or shopping lists penned in colorful icing.