Starting everyone's morning off with a few mind boggling reveals, Glen Collins drops this bomb in the Times today: Next year Shake Shack will open locations in Kuwait, the Upper East Side, and Midtown Manhattan. And those projects are of course in addition to Danny Meyer's bid for a space on the Boston Common, the new Nolita space, and the new Shack in Miami. Pause. Breathe. Continue.
The new Upper East side space will sit on the southeast corner of 86th and Lexington next to the Barnes & Noble and that clutch 4,5,6 subway stop. UES, your prayers have finally, finally been answered.
The Midtown branch will open on the southwest corner of 44th Street and 8th Avenue, right near Schnippers and the New York Times Building and a hub for theater-loving tourists. Midtown Lunch, Frank Bruni (known Shackhead), your holiday dreams have come true.
As for the Kuwait branch (perhaps that's what happened to the rumored Dubai plans when that city went bust), it will be managed by a company that handles a number of American brands in the Middle East like Starbucks and Dean & DeLuca.
Oh, and another cute factoid from this piece: it looks like Shake Shack does double the business of America's fast food chains. They take in $4 million each in sales where an average McDonald's takes in $2.29 million. Expect many, many, many more Shacks to come as Meyer slowly achieves world domination.
