NATCHEZ — You’ve heard of the wars on drugs, terror and even women.

But in the Miss-Lou, the transition at the end of the school year marks the beginning of another war — the war on heat.

And for many, the best way to score a quick battle victory is to throw — well, maybe not throw — a snoball at it, fighting back against the summer sun with syrup, cream and shaved ice.

“You want to beat the heat, and the lack of show that we have here makes the concept of selling ice even more attractive — and that’s what we’re doing, selling ice with sugar and making it as much like snow as possible,” said Jase Ellis, who along with Tance Hughes has opened The Sno Co. in the parking lot of the Concordia Square Shopping Center in Vidalia.

And while beating the summer temperatures with the ice isn’t a difficult concept, but it is fun, said Mitch Ballard, who also entered the war on heat this summer with the opening of Snozone at 624 U.S. 61 North in Natchez.

“It is not very complicated,” Ballard said. “People like their snocones, and it brings them happiness.”

The snoball — or snocone, depending on who says it — market already has a number of other representative businesses in the Miss-Lou, but both Ellis and Ballard said their businesses offer something unique.

At Snozone, that’s offering flavors like cream dreamcicle, which is made by adding cream to the syrup instead of adding cream to the snoball and then adding syrup.

“It tastes just like ice cream,” Ballard said.

Snozone also focuses on replicating the authentic New Orleans snoball experience — and the stand itself was bought from New Orleans.

“In restaraunts, everything they make is on crushed ice, but with snoballs, with the shaved ice, it is just different, a better texture that brings out the flavor more,” Ballard said. “When you go some other places and you get something with a flavor in it, you can kind of taste it, but with a snoball banana tastes like a banana, blue raspberry really tastes like a blue raspberry. It really catches the flavor.”

The Sno Co.’s take on icy treats with a twist is to offer stuffed snoballs, which is a snoball with soft-serve ice cream in the middle.

“We want to make the ice as fine as possible, with as few shards and crunchy pieces as possible so that the snoball is soft,” Ellis said. “You want to use just the right amount of syrup where the flavor and the texture are perfect and it’s not an overpowering flavor and not a distracting texture.”

MLK-Natchez Snoballs and Snack Shop is in its third season, but has moved to a new location this year, at 1187 N. Martin Luther King Jr. St. in Natchez.

And with the move comes a new flavor that owner Elvis Prater said is unique to his store — green apple caramel.

“The idea just came to me, and  I tried it, and it came out pretty good,” Prater said. “People really like it.”

Snoballs are a seasonal item, Prater said, but when they’re in season, they’re definitely the best selling item at the snack shop.

“They’re the main thing we sell right now — anything else is just extra,” he said.

“There is nothing that cools you off like a snoball in this hot weather. You can try a cold glass of iced tea or lemonade, but nothing cools you off like a snoball — and it doesn’t hurt your pocket, either.”

And Ellis said that even if the heat tries to take the victory from you, that’s why the structure of a snoball is still a win.

“They are easy to eat, and even if they melt, they still taste delicious,” he said. “It is something that you can eat that you can grab on the go, and if it melts you have something still worth eating.”

The Sno Co. can be found online at facebook.com/welovesno/

MLK Snoballs can be found online at facebook.com/MlksnoballsNatchez or contacted by phone at 601-431-3706.

Snozone can be reached at 601-446-3485.