The New Stand wants to invigorate your daily routine. They want you to do anything but battle boredom while rushing from your apartment to your office, and then back home again.
It opened on November 24th at Union Square Station, where about 97,747 people pass each day.
It's right off the dirty, dilapidated entrance to the L train, and it stands out like a diamond in a haystack.
It's is a bright, white little shop with modular, magnetic walls, and its shelves are packed with products like condoms, antique wooden recording devices, collapsable bike helmets, kale, mineral water, and juices. Everything is for sale for $200 or fewer.
Its founders, George Alan and Lex Kendall, are colliding retail with media. They have a membership program that allows shoppers to purchase their wares for lower prices, once they've downloaded the shop's app.
"We were like, 'Let's see if there actually are these places available,' and amazingly Union Square was available," Kendall told Fashionista. "There were two weeks to go on the [request for proposal] so we had to really hustle and we were like, 'Are we going to do this?'"
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They did do it. They signed a 10-year lease with the MTA. They also opened another, bigger location on Black Friday at Brookfield Place.
"[The MTA was] really delighted to see us because they were like, 'How did you young entrepreneurs find your way here? We explained that we went digging," Kendall said.
Members don't just get deals on products; with The New Stand's app, members also get new stories, new music (and playlists), and new video every day. They send out two daily blasts: one in the morning and the other in the evening.
drinkpurebrazilian The long awaited @thenewstand is finally open at the Union Square subway station and Brookfield place! Couldn't be a cooler concept and the best part is they are stocked with Pure Brazilian! #purebrazilian #drinkpb #newstand #nycsubway #coolstuff #hppbeverages #thenewstand #grabandgo #nyc #hydrate #photooftheday #instagood #unionsquare #brookfieldplace
If you become a member, you can also sync your credit cards for much faster payment in their shiny Union Square store.
"We are a convenience store on many levels," said The New Stand's CEO Andrew Deitchman. "We talk about ourselves as this 'day improvement company.' It's the way we train staff, it's the way we judge ourselves."
So, next time you pass through Union Square or Brookfield Place and find yourself drinking fresh-pressed juice and bumping to a new jam that was shot to your phone while you wait for your train, you'll know why.
"What it speaks to is this sense of optimism that we want to be able to provide people in their lives," Deitchman said.
Check out When New Yorkers Got Their News from... Newsstands?!
[via Fashionista] [Feature Image Courtesy DNA Info]