Max Brenner wants to be the chocolatier’s answer to Starbucks.
His recently opened Union Square store — Max Brenner Chocolate, quirkily subtitled “Chocolate by the Bald Man” — is meant to make a big, cocoa-coated splash. Brenner, 38 and bald as a baby’s bottom, isn’t shy about his vision for the U.S. market.
“We expect hundreds and hundreds [of stores], no doubt, because the concept has mass appeal,” Brenner said as he sat in his flagship store — a 4,000-square-foot, three-level restaurant-cafe that opened in July, where the visual language mixes both Willy Wonka fantasy and European sophistication. He already operates 12 locations in Israel, Australia and Singapore.
The restaurant and confectionery menu touts 150 breakfast, lunch, dinner and brunch items, most of which come back to a chocolatey theme. They include cold and hot chocolate beverages, truffles and chocolate fondue (see below).
While Brenner remains the only dedicated milk-and-dark merchant with a full-fledged restaurant in New York, other chocolate specialists are heading in the same direction — some now offer beverages, following in the footsteps of chocolate chef Jacques Torres, who opened his first store in Dumbo in 2000. Chains like Brenner’s exist in other cities — including Ethel’s Chocolate Lounge in Chicago, which says it plans to expand to other major cities soon.
These forays into the market would seem well-timed given increasing U.S. chocolate sales — to say nothing of the average American’s girth. In 2005, consumers spent an estimated $15.7 billion on all types of chocolates, according to the National Confectioners Association. And gourmet chocolate sales, which are only 5 percent of all retail candy sales, increased by 30 percent.
It’s the super-premium segment that shows extraordinarily strong growth, though the emerging mass-premium portion is also coming into its own, said Joan Steuer, a chocolate marketing expert and founding editor of Chocolate Magazine. She said Brenner is seeking to make chocolate “fun and accessible.”
It’s already pretty accessible to the average chocoholic. Boxed chocolate retailers now routinely feature beverage bars. Starbucks launched a liquid chocolate drink, Chantico, in early 2005, though it was scuttled by December amid mixed reviews (some reviewers said it was too rich and thick).
More common are gourmet artisanal chocolatiers such as Vosges Haut-Chocolat, Godiva and Mason du Chocolat, whose Manhattan boutiques have a decidedly high-end appeal.
While some European cafes have long offered the good stuff, New York chocolate drinks didn’t move out of the instant powder and marshmallow stage until 2000, when famed chocolate chef Jacques Torres of Chocolate Haven opened his first store in Dumbo.
“Remember, Americans are big coffee drinkers, and chocolate, nobody is drinking chocolate,” Torres said.
“Many people say, ‘no, it’s for kids,'” continued Torres, recalling initial reaction to his beverages when first introduced at his Dumbo store. “You have no idea how much I had to give away before being able to sell it.”
Ethel’s Chocolate Lounge, a high-end division of confectioner Mars Inc. and its Mars Retail Group, which has opened 10 storefronts in the Chicago area since 2005, could be looking to coat the Big Apple soon. Ethel’s is looking to open in other major cities by the spring, though John Haugh, president of Mars Retail Group, wouldn’t identify the regions the company is considering.
Similarities between the two chains are apt — both look to create a warm atmosphere in which people can linger and enjoy a range of chocolate beverages and snacks.
But Max Brenner has a larger menu and a larger footprint. Ethel’s stores range from 800 to 2,400 square feet, with a 1,400-square-foot target, according to Haugh, whereas Brenner says his stores will go no lower than 2,000 square feet.
Max Brenner has deep pockets, with backing from Strauss-Elite, an Israeli food and drink company with a market capitalization of $1.1 billion.
Will an all-chocolate cafe sell on Main Street? Maybe.
“If he has good partners, he can do for chocolate what Starbucks did for espresso, or Wolfgang Puck did for focaccia in this country,” said Cheryl Swanson, a principal at New York-based brand strategy firm Toniq.
Brenner is turning premium brands into everyday luxuries rather than keeping them in the realm of “special occasion” treats, said Swanson. “He’s making chocolate experiential, and branding the experience well — by using symbolism that is both intriguing and fun — ‘chocolate by the bald man’ — and consequently memorable.”
Rather than look to other chocolatiers, Brenner aspires to emulate the Cheesecake Factory, a wildly successful franchise that’s high on experiential dining and expert service.
“One day you’ll say chocolate and that’s what it will mean — Max Brenner,” Brenner said.
Rich fare for upscale sweet teeth
Max Brenner Chocolate’s boasts a 30-page menu that leaves customers a bit awed at his visions for the culinary possibilities of chocolate. It might make you hungry — or want to go on a diet. On a recent afternoon in the newly opened restaurant and cafe in Union Square, Brenner displayed a table full of his cocoa bean-based creations, many of which he learned to make while working as a pastry chef in Europe: banana split waffles drowning in chocolate sauce, playful vanilla ice cream fondue, a sinful looking Choconut Martini, an intense double chocolate fudge cake and an assortment of cold and hot chocolate beverages fused with everything from caramel toffee to chocolate waffle balls, melting marshmallows, red chilis, truffles…and on and on and on.
Brenner’s banking on the notion that with every dish comes a story, a theatrical production or an interactive dining experience.
Ceremony is paramount, explained Brenner as he demonstrated the Suckao — a candled-warmed mug in which diners melt chocolate bits along with stirred-in milk. Sipped through a metal spoon, the effect is of a dense, concentrated shot of espresso-like chocolate.
“The point is to smell, touch and play with the textures,” Brenner said. “It’s a totally different experience.”