Pop Shop to open in Medford in fall 2014

The Pop Shop, a 50s-era restaurant often packed to the brim with kids, families and couples in Collingswood, N.J., is trying to strike gold twice.

The Medford’s planning board unanimously approved Pop Shop’s application to open a new franchise in the old Farmers and Mechanics Bank building on the corner of Main Street and Bank Street.

The new restaurant will feature approximately 150 tables and about five seats around a soda fountain near the bank’s vault over the property’s two floors. The outside will feature a rainbow of balloons against a butter-colored background. The inside will have the same kind of 50s-inspired decor but with a Medford twist. The menu will remain the same as the Collingswood shop, albeit with some changed names to reflect the shop’s Medford location.

The Pop Shop opened in Collingswood on Haddon Avenue in 2005 serving American comfort food, as the shop’s co-owner, Bill “Stink” Fisher, calls it. The soda fountain in the store – the bar, stools and backsplash where customers can sit and order ice cream – is a point of pride for Fisher. He won the soda fountain on eBay for $2,000 from a seller in Ohio. He then drove out there in a truck, dismantled and packed it into his truck, and hauled it back to Collingswood.

Fisher and his business partner, Connie Correia, have known they wanted to expand the Pop Shop since they began planning the original Collingswood location in 2004, but it wasn’t until Fisher spoke with Michael Pagnatta, the Medford Pop Shop’s architect, that Fisher considered the Burlington County town.

Fisher instantly liked the idea.

“Medford is a near and dear place to my heart,” Fished said. “My parents had a day camp [Mountain Run Day Camp] out there, and I love the air there.”

Operating hours

Sunday 7 a.m. – 8 p.m.

Monday-Thursday 7 a.m. – 9 p.m.

Friday & Saturday 7 a.m. – 10 p.m.

The shop will have stairs and an elevator in the back for employees and disabled customers to access the second floor.

Fisher said he looks forward to expanding all over South Jersey and even the Philly suburbs. The Pop Shop is slated to open in the late fall in Medford.