Ghost kitchen operator Zuul announced this week it has joined forces with lifestyle brand Thrillist to launch a “rotational ghost kitchen” offering delivery exclusives from top NYC chefs and restaurants. The program will run on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday nights from Dec. 9 – April 16, according to a press release sent to The Spoon.
A series of 10 different NYC restaurants will each hold a two-week residency offering exclusive delivery-only meal offerings made out of Zuul’s ghost kitchen facility in Manhattan’s SoHo neighborhood. The idea is to highlight the ghost kitchen concept — which quickly evolved from an optional add-on to a must-have for many restaurants — as an important element of the pandemic-era restaurant businesses.
Zuul and Thrillist said in this week’s press release that the program is also a way to lend support to struggling restaurants as they fight to keep the lights on in the wake of new COVID-19-related restrictions. Full-service restaurants have been hit particularly hard over the last several months, since the experience they historically offer has been tailored to the dining room and their food does not always travel well. The Zuul/Thrillist program is meant to help these restaurants “reinvent” themselves to better fit into a restaurant biz centered on off-premises orders.
To that end, Thrillist will cover the costs for food ingredients, labor, packaging, and delivery for participating restaurants. Those restaurants will be able to take advantage of Zuul’s all-in-one ghost kitchen facility, which provides not only space to make the food but also the technical infrastructure to fulfill delivery orders. That in turn will let Zuul show its ghost kitchen concept to more restaurants, a wise move considering the company’s ambitions to expand across NYC.
Customers can order from these rotating ghost kitchens here. For the swag-lovers out there, all orders contain “a special kit” that includes a t-shirt designed by a local artist, a reusable cutlery set, portable wine tumblers, and an insulated bag.
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