When Kitty Bernardo, bar supervisor at Paradise Misplaced, noticed some business mates stroll into the bar on the finish of their shift, they knew they have been in hassle. You see, Bernardo had “iced” these mates earlier within the night time. Sure, iced. Like from 2010s lolcat web. “I bear in mind seeing my mates icing one another in faculty and considering, That is such a ridiculous pattern that may’t presumably hold happening. This was proper across the time different viral traits just like the Cinnamon Problem and Planking have been occurring, so I used to be satisfied that this was going to be simply one other a kind of passing fads that’ll be right here and gone,” says Bernardo. And but, right here they have been, icing and being iced in 2025, having the time of their life.
Icing was “invented” in 2010. The foundations are easy: You shock your sufferer with a Smirnoff Ice—the citrusy malt beverage—typically hid in some inventive manner. They have to chug it on the spot, until they’ve a Smirnoff Ice on their particular person to dam the assault, by which case the unique icer turns into the icee. It started on faculty campuses, the place the enduring reputation of ingesting video games, a style for easy-drinking alcopops and nascent visible social media platforms (you would already tag your pals in Fb pictures or add your night time to Photobucket, and Instagram debuted in July 2010) smashed collectively. No longer solely might you prank your pals, you would publish about the ever extra elaborate methods you probably did it, inspiring copycats and rivals all over the world. It was a meme, IRL.
“Was” is just not the best tense right here. Fifteen years after it started, icing has outlasted comparable dated traits just like the Ice Bucket Problem and the Milk Crate Problem. And why not? Icing is timeless, an “irreverent but ritualistic handshake,” as Bernardo places it, cementing that regardless of how unhealthy issues get, you’re nonetheless dedicated to snort. Even when meaning it’s important to chug a Smirnoff Ice.
For some, the custom has remained amongst household and mates because the 2010s (see: the marriage I went to the place the bride was iced by her personal mom). However others are new to the prank. TikTok is full of individuals far too younger to have been round at icing’s inception, however nonetheless getting in on the prank, pulling it off at weddings and birthdays and household gatherings.
“My companion and I’ve created a multiyear custom of icing their brother and his spouse,” says author Lindsay Lee Wallace. She by no means took half in faculty, however the alternative for a low-stakes sibling competitors was, properly, intoxicating. “Extra just lately we hid six bottles all through their just lately bought residence on Thanksgiving. One yr we wrapped Ices and gave one to every member of the family on Christmas.”
Kian Sharafi, common supervisor of Mister Paradise in Manhattan, says icing has come again in an enormous manner in some native business circles. He claims it began when of us from Coqodaq, one other New York restaurant, got here to Mister Paradise and iced him whereas he was making drinks. “I really had a reservation at Coqodaq per week or two after that,” he says. “So then I introduced a complete six-pack to ice the entire bar crew.” Now, he and Bernardo say, there’s a “full-on ice warfare” amongst a number of bars in New York. “I’ll all the time be on guard at Mister Paradise, Residence 5 and Coqodaq,” says Bernardo.
Sharafi has additionally iced prospects with a stash that the bar retains readily available, if they appear like they’ve the best vibe and wish to take part. “All people remembers that that is only a dumb, enjoyable factor to do,” he says. As pranks go, it’s a reasonably tame one: “No person really will get damage in any respect. It’s low-impact and—I don’t know if ‘high-reward’ is the best phrase—however persons are drawn to it.”
Bernardo says the resurgence, or continuation, of icing, performs into our present period of “ironic nostalgia.” However that nostalgia is exhibiting its head elsewhere, and seems deeply honest. It’s the identical drive placing ’70s cocktails on the menu—sure, there’s a wink, however the enjoyable is actual.
“That is tremendous tacky, however working bits make me really feel like my mates and family members will hold being round for lengthy sufficient that I’ll get to ice them at their upcoming main life occasions, and so they’ll ice me at mine, and that’s as lovely as it’s nauseating,” says Wallace. Icing has lasted as a result of greater than some other mid-2010s web prank, you a minimum of get one thing gratifying out of it on the finish. Bernardo echoes the sentiment. “If I ice you, it means I like you… It’s a sick and twisted olive department that brings folks collectively,” they are saying. “Nevertheless it’s additionally simply humorous as hell.”
