Eataly Eataly, just off New York’s Madison Square Park, is unlike anything I have seen before. At 50,000sq ft, this eat-in-or-out emporium is far larger than the original Eataly in Turin, or its branches in Bologna or Japan. To a Londoner it may appear comparable to the foodhalls of Selfridges or Harrods, but because everything is Italian and run by one company, it seems more homogeneous, more simpatico. The original investment of $20m (“and counting”, according to one of its main partners) has been matched by an equally enormous response. On a single Saturday, 12,800 customers poured through the doors, resulting in queues of people outside. (They received a temporary reward in the form of an ice-cream tasting.) Even more impressive is the fact that Eataly, which opened in August, has created more than 500 new jobs – and that’s without counting the positive impact on the artisanal food producers who stock its shelves. Oscar Farinetti created the Eataly brand after a successful business career led him to buy wineries in Italy, including Fontanafredda in Piemonte, where he subsequently opened restaurants. In New York he has teamed up with Joe Bastianich and Mario Batali who, since they met in 1997, working as lead waiter and lead chef at a prestigious dinner, have opened Babbo, Otto and Del Posto restaurants to great acclaim. Yet in spite of this impressive track record, the initial success of Eataly seems to have stunned even them. On plan, Eataly resembles a gun, with the barrel running between the entrances on 5th Avenue west and the handle running down to 23rd Street. This means that access is pretty easy if you want to drop in for a coffee, an ice cream (not creamy enough in my opinion), a panini or a pastry. By the 23rd Street exit are the areas devoted to cured meats, mozzarella, pasta and the wine shop which, to meet the state’s arcane licensing laws, has to be in a separate building. But Eataly’s most exciting feature – its heart – is its cafés and restaurants. In La Piazza, a standing-only area, I felt immediately transported to Milan. Other casual-eating options include pizza, pasta and, at Il Pesce and Le Verdure, fish and vegetable dishes, respectively. Only at Manzo, the meat restaurant with an exceptional chef in Michael Toscano, is there a formal setting. Reservations are taken, but strictly on a “first come, first served” basis. Over coffee in Manzo, Bastianich, who is responsible for the service and business aspects, told Batali (who confesses that he enters Eataly “only from the delicious point of view”) something that had even this normally garrulous chef lost for words. Eataly, Bastianich said, is on course to be New York’s highest-grossing restaurant by the end of its first year. “We’re looking at annual sales of over $40m once we’ve got the Alpine restaurant on the roof open which will seat another 200,” he explained. Eataly New York has two significant investors who have put up half the capital between them, as well as substantial backing from five major Italian companies (Lavazza coffee, Petra flour, Grana Padano cheese, Moretti beer and Fontanafredda wine). Farinetti has chosen his partners cleverly and in Batali he has a figurehead who seems to draw every female customer to his side, scrabbling for her mobile phone so that she can have her picture taken alongside the famous TV chef. Batali’s conspicuous passion for “all things good at the table” is also hugely important, as is the enthusiasm he imparts to his staff. While New Yorkers, the partners and the shareholders are Eataly’s most immediate beneficiaries, two others may not be too far behind. The first is the image and reputation of Italy itself that can only prosper from this success. Then there are cities in north and south America where, Batali believes, this formula can be repeated. I asked him to put London on that list.
Eataly 200 5th Avenue, New York 10010, (00 1) 212 229 2560, www.newyork.eataly.it