The signs went up in the windows at 509 Main Street in Islip in bold red and cream: Coming Soon, Gemelli's Gourmet of Islip, bringing authentic flavor closer to home. The sandwich and catering shop announced the new location on its Instagram over the weekend, and the posters in the glass are already asking for help, pointing applicants to the company's website.

Long Islanders who know the block will recognize the storefront before they recognize the name. Until this spring, 509 Main Street was Coyle's Ice Cream, the homemade scoop shop that has been an Islip fixture for years and a South Shore name since 1985. Coyle's did not go far. Its own site now lists the Islip shop at 539 Main Street, a few doors down the same block, where it reopened this spring. The move left behind a prime piece of the village's walkable stretch near Islip Town Hall, and it has a taker.

Two names that already share a roof

The succession is less of a coincidence than it looks. In Lindenhurst, Gemelli's Gourmet and Coyle's Ice Cream share the same address at 189 South Wellwood Avenue, a storefront the two businesses opened together in 2025. Both companies list it on their own sites today: Coyle's counts it among its three shops, and Gemelli's calls it home on its Instagram page. A reader who has stood in that line knows the arrangement, ice cream and Italian gourmet under one roof.

So when Coyle's moved down the block in Islip, the storefront it vacated went to the sandwich maker it already knows. Islip becomes Gemelli's second South Shore location, and the old ice cream corner stays in the family, at least in spirit.

Who Gemelli's is

Gemelli's Gourmet describes itself simply: gourmet sandwiches, a chopped salad bar, and catering. Its website says the family business has been serving Long Island since 1988, and the Lindenhurst shop is affiliated with Gemelli Gourmet Market North in Glen Head, a full prepared-foods market with a butcher, a deli and sushi. The Islip hiring call gives a sense of the scale planned for the new shop: the company's careers page takes applications for kitchen staff, deli clerks, salad bar clerks and butchers.

One housekeeping note for anyone keeping track of Long Island's several Gemellis: the company goes out of its way, right in its Instagram bio, to note that it is not affiliated with the similarly named restaurant in Babylon. On an island where half the good delis seem to share a name, the distinction matters to them.

What is coming to the counter

The Lindenhurst menu is the best preview Islip has. The shop builds its reputation on gourmet sandwiches and wraps, a chopped salad bar, and catering trays for the birthday parties and office lunches that keep a South Shore deli busy. The Coming Soon posters in Islip repeat the same three promises: gourmet sandwiches, chopped salad bar, catering.

What the announcement does not include is a date. The signs say coming soon and nothing more, and the company has not published an opening timeline. The hiring push suggests the buildout is real rather than aspirational, and the storefront it is moving into was serving customers as recently as this spring, which usually means a shorter runway than a gut renovation.

A good stretch for Islip's Main Street

For the village, the succession is the best kind of Main Street news. A storefront that could have sat dark after its tenant moved instead gets a proven operator, and the block near the town hall keeps its foot traffic. Coyle's is still scooping a few doors away. And residents get something Islip's stretch of Main Street did not have: a dedicated gourmet sandwich counter from a name the South Shore already trusts, close enough to walk from the old one.

Keep an eye on the windows at 509. When the red posters come down and the opening date goes up, the corner that fed Islip dessert for years will start feeding it lunch.