{"id":364630,"date":"2026-10-05T08:00:15","date_gmt":"2026-10-05T08:00:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/364630\/"},"modified":"2026-10-05T08:00:15","modified_gmt":"2026-10-05T08:00:15","slug":"million-goods-opens-flagship-mens-store-in-fort-greene-blending-fashion-and-hospitality","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/364630\/","title":{"rendered":"Million Goods Opens Flagship Men’s Store in Fort Greene, Blending Fashion and Hospitality"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tBuilding a \u201ccommunity\u201d has become the latest catchphrase in retail<\/a> as merchants strive to move beyond just selling a bunch of products and work to build lasting relationships with their target customers.<\/p>\n

\n\tWhile nearly everyone is jumping on this bandwagon, there are a few stores that appear to have nailed it. Million Goods is one of them.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe Brooklyn<\/a>-based retailer founded by Drew Kaufmann and Matt Reyer opened a small storefront in Greenpoint in 2024 that offered a wine bar, music and an assortment of under-the-radar men\u2019s brands.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe reaction was strong enough to prompt Million Goods to open a second, larger location in Fort Greene. The new 2,100-square-foot flagship in a landmarked building at 201 DeKalb Avenue replicates the concept of the first store, just on a larger scale.<\/p>\n

\n\tKaufmann, whose background includes Maison Kitsune and Bird Brooklyn<\/a>, started brainstorming about creating a business that blended fashion and hospitality before the pandemic. \u201cI saw every season that e-commerce companies like Ssense and Net-a-porter were taking a bigger bite of the business while independent stores struggled,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\n\tHe said he had \u201calways preferred curated, off-the-beaten-path independents,\u201d and knew that online retailers could never offer the same experience as a physical store \u2014 something he believed could offer a \u201ccompetitive advantage. Hospitality is something tech companies can\u2019t do,\u201d Kaufmann said.<\/p>\n

\n\tHe saw that listening bars had become popular in Japan and also identified a trend toward natural wines. So he decided to combine those two concepts with a fashion assortment centered around emerging brands, and approached Reyer about opening a store.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"The<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tThe Million Goods store in Fort Greene, N.Y.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tJoe Thomas<\/p>\n

\n\tReyer, who had started an e-commerce company in the automotive space that he sold to private equity, also had a background in the music industry, booking artists for shows in the Denver area. Despite the fact he had no fashion experience, when Kaufmann approached him with his idea, he was all in.<\/p>\n

\n\tWithin a year of opening the first 600-square-foot Million Goods in Greenpoint<\/a>, they realized they were onto something, but needed more space. They found the location in Fort Greene, where they knew their target demographic was located, and signed a lease.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"The<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tThe store is located on DeKalb Avenue.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tJoe Thomas<\/p>\n

\n\tTo pay for the expansion, the founders lined up a number of investors including Arock Castillo, founder of BPM Music, and Malcolm Dia, founder of Manual NYC.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe store, which also features an outdoor garden, was designed with architect Gjergji Shkurti of Figure Ground. The main floor features the listening room, bar and banquettes while the upstairs offers the apparel assortment and a back room for socializing. A spiral staircase connects the two floors.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"The<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tThe garden space.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tJoe Thomas<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWe fell in love with the staircase that could break the store down into two spaces,\u201d Kaufmann said. Shkurti painted the staircase a bright red, which Reyer said \u201cbeckons\u201d customers to explore the second floor.<\/p>\n

\n\tIn addition, much of the original character of the space was retained including the tin ceilings, fireplaces and wood floors. The architect also used Sapele millwork in a pecan tone, honed Breccia Pernice stone, Louis Poulsen lights and custom aluminum fixtures in the space. Frama and Emeco furniture complements the millwork throughout, including Philippe Starck\u2019s Emeco stools at the bar and Tasca stools and chairs in the garden.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"Million<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tThe store is intended to be a gathering space for shoppers.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tJoe Thomas<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cIt is designed for people to slow down and spend time,\u201d Kaufmann said. \u201cWhether someone comes in looking for a specific pair of trousers or simply walks in off the street, we want them to feel comfortable having a glass of wine or a cup of tea, reading a book in the backyard or wandering upstairs to discover something new. It is a place of ultimate leisure.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tReyer added: \u201cThe space is designed to ask questions. At our Greenpoint location, the typical questions we receive is, \u2018What is this place?\u2019 A question that turns into discovery, exploring the backyard garden, then sitting down for a glass of wine or browsing the collections. At Fort Greene, we carried this over by installing large windows in the back of the listening floor so you can preview the garden from the entrance while also asking yourself, \u2018What\u2019s up this spiral staircase?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tIn terms of merchandise, the store offers a range of independent brands including Amomento, Archie, Berner K\u00fchl, Coor, Document, \u00c9tudes Studios, Margaret Howell, MMIC, Nicholas Daley<\/a>, OAMC Peacemaker, Pace, Pelegrim, Rold Skov, Soulland and Sunbuddies, among others. <\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cBroadly speaking, we look for clothes that are clean and easy to wear, but still have some sort of edge or coolness,\u201d Kaufmann said. \u201cUnfussy is a word we use a lot. Everything should fit into your wardrobe effortlessly and make you look cool immediately.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tKaufmann said the customer in Greenpoint is a bit younger, averaging late 20s to early 30s who just got their first high-paying job. The Fort Greene shopper is expected to be older, mid-30s to early 40s, who are in \u201ccreative-adjacent industries. They\u2019re the cool guy in the tech or finance office,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\n\tLooking ahead, they said they\u2019re hoping to add other stores in the future. First up would be London, and they\u2019re also contemplating expansion into hotels and other hospitality-related businesses.<\/p>\n

\n\tAmbitious, no doubt, but \u201cyou\u2019ve got to have a plan,\u201d Kaufmann said with a laugh.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Building a \u201ccommunity\u201d has become the latest catchphrase in retail as merchants strive to move beyond just selling…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":364631,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[98,100,99,135217,9,24,63,5943],"class_list":["post-364630","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-brooklyn","tag-brooklyn","tag-brooklyn-headlines","tag-brooklyn-news","tag-mens-retail","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-retail"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/364630","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=364630"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/364630\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/364631"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=364630"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=364630"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=364630"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}