Catering to Simpler Tastes

“Food businesses have been sharing kitchen space in New York for years,” says Lunch Cube General Manager Nate Tietge. “There’s never been a space need for it here. Here, it’s an advent of a green mindset, but it also makes plain economical sense. Why would you build new when you can use?”

Nate Tietge, general manager of the Lunch Cube, shows off his firm’s low-cost fare—and its high-style branding. Photo by Craig Bares.

That’s where the Lunch Cube’s simple concept comes in—gourmet sandwiches delivered in a simple cardboard cube. The recipes are chef driven, including the Black and Blue Panini (roast beef, blue cheese, and grilled onion with red wine aioli) and the Chairman (grilled pastrami, provolone, and smoked tomato aioli with jalapeño relish).

“Some people are like, ‘$7.95—huh?’” Teitge says. “But then when they get it in their hands, they’re like, ‘Wow—this is a giant sandwich!’” Lunches are modular, too, with side options added to the box. Even the cookies are cube shaped. When an order hits $200, the Lunch Cube advises customers to switch to platters (which accounts for about half its business).

The Rosewood Room kitchen swarms with Lunch Cube prep and assembly staff in the morning. Employees make free deliveries on bikes using custom-made delivery bags. Keeping the delivery area within biking distance of the Warehouse District keeps costs down. (There are exceptions to this close-in rule, like big customer Wells Fargo Mortgage down towards Lake Street.)

“We have a lot of repeat clients, especially those who provide a lunch not just for meetings, but for morale and the tax break,” Tietge says. “This is absolutely a recession-proof catering model.”

In Northeast, Chowgirls has based its expansion plans on that model. Founded (in 2004), owned, and operated by Amy Brown and Heidi Andermack, Chowgirls features down-home cooking, which includes items like beef stew, meat loaf, and Swedish meatballs priced at $11 for boxed lunches and more for platters, with pies, cobblers, and crumbles for dessert. Vegetarian options are also available. “The word ‘comfort’ in our branding definitely draws people,” Brown says. Hot lunches are a specialty; Brown and Andermack also do brown-bag and cold plattered lunches.