Dairy Air, a Montclair ice cream shop that opened a year ago to a firestorm about its "sexualized" logo, has closed, and its owner is blaming "extremist radical liberals" for his business's demise.

Owner Anthony Tortoriello had harsh words for the locals who called the cow's-rump logo “offensive and sickening" and hosted a community meeting about the matter.

"They were on a crusade to destroy my business and my life," said Tortoriello, who added that he is fed up and retiring from business. "I was totally berated and accused of being a woman-hater. It was nonstop harassment; it never ended."

The uproar was set in motion last year by Amy Tingle and Maya Stein, owners of Creativity Caravan, a Montclair "studio, gallery and imaginarium," according to their website.

"A hypersexualized cow with her ass upended and poking through a circle, tail raised up, waiting for what? I'm not sure, but I do know that I am repulsed and offended," Tingle said last December. "This kind of marketing scheme is the reason we currently have a sexual predator in the White House."

The story quickly became a cause célèbre in Montclair, a liberal bastion that former Gov. Chris Christie famously dubbed the "People's Republic of Montclair," and was debated on social media and covered by news outlets across the country.

The logo that caused the ruckus — a cow with blonde pigtails, a beret and a tattoo on its bare, upturned rump — was never changed, despite Tortoriello's stated intention to alter it in the wake of the uproar. Tortoriello defended the logo in a December 2017 press release, saying, “We simply created a fun illustration to complement our fun name,” while saying he neverthelss was working on a new logo.

However, Tortoriello told NorthJersey.com and the USA TODAY NETWORK New Jersey on Monday, he made a "business decision" not to change the logo after all.

"Rebranding would have cost over $15,000, not including everything that had been printed with the logo, which would have to go in the garbage," he said. "Even on principle, do I want to spend $25,000 of my own money on that?"

The building's landlord, Joe Wang, was at the store Sunday evening meeting with prospective tenants. He attributed the closing of Dairy Air to its business hours, pointing to a sign that showed it was open only Thursday through Sunday every week. "They couldn't pay the rent with their limited hours," he said.

Tingle, who declined to "resurrect the controversy or address any grievances that arose because of it," did suggest in a statement that Dairy Air's closing likely had more to do with high overhead than the dust-up over the logo.

"As a business owner whose brick-and-mortar is also closing at the end of this month, I can attest that it is extremely hard to manage the high rents and costs associated with owning any small business in New Jersey," she wrote.

Tingle added that she works as a volunteer advocate with S.A.V.E. of Essex County, accompanying sexual assaultsurvivors to hospitals and police stations, and that she "worked really hard to stay focused on what I could do personally to make a positive difference in our community."

Tortoriello, who sold his stake in Frank Anthony's restaurant in Verona to open Dairy Air, said he has no plans other than to spend more time with his wife and two high-school-age daughters.

"I'm retiring. That's it. I'm done," he said.

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He said the harassment over the logo persisted even after the media focus abated. "People would walk in and see the logo and it would start up again, not to mention the letters and emails," Tortoriello said. "People would come into the shop and impose their opinions on my staff, in their face."

He said his daughters were "embarrassed" to go to school. "It's not fair for a 15-year-old to get harassed by extremist radical liberal people."

"There's a cost of doing business, and sometimes it's just not worth it," he said.

Email: jmartin@gannettnj.com