Ice-cream vans, by Luke Stephenson – in pictures

These are not cute vintage vans, dispensing cones of rose sorbet and salt caramel to middle-class festival-goers. They are Transits, plastered with Disney cartoons in varying states of fadedness, trawling the streets selling 99 Flakes. Photograph: Luke Stephenson

As anyone familiar with the Glasgow ice-cream wars will tell you, it’s a tough business. Apart from the seasonal nature of the work – it’s hard to think of many other jobs so reliant on sunshine – there are disagreements about turf. Photograph: Luke Stephenson

These may not involve violence, sabotage, intimidation and murder, as they did in Scotland in the 1980s (for the record, drugs were also involved), but things can get heated. Photograph: Luke Stephenson

Ray, owner of Super Soft Ice, sells ice-creams in Hackney, east London. Nowadays, he says, arguments are rare – if a van owner starts working an area that already has an established seller, a quiet word will usually see them off. Photograph: Luke Stephenson

Vans aren’t cheap, around £85,000 for a new one, so Ray built his using parts from an older van. It’s part-time work, he says, and he makes just enough to get by. “I only work about five months a year, so I don’t get bored,” he says. He’s deluged when it’s sunny, but when it’s not, it’s pointless going out. “I haven’t made much money this year, it’s been a bit of a disaster, weather-wise.” Photograph: Luke Stephenson

The best bit of the job is hearing kids shriek with joy when you pull up – but it can also be the worst. “I hate it when kids run across the road without looking. I’ve had a couple of near misses.” Photograph: Luke Stephenson