Gothamist<\/a>, company president Nicolas Baizan told employees in an October 1 email that every location would close permanently at the end of that business day. A public announcement followed on Friday, October 2, on the company\u2019s website and social media.<\/p>\n\u201cUnfortunately, we no longer have the funding required to operate this business,\u201d Baizan reportedly wrote in the employee email.<\/p>\n
He cited declining consumer spending and changing preferences as factors affecting sales, saying the company had worked with its board and investors throughout the year to address those challenges. Employees would be paid through October 18, according to the email.\u00a0<\/p>\n
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View this post on Instagram<\/p>\n
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The timing made the shutdown especially jarring. On Thursday, Chip City\u2019s Instagram account still encouraged customers to visit the following day for a seasonal Crisp Apple Fritter Cookie, complete with glazed doughnut pieces, apple pie filling and vanilla icing. Customers also told Gothamist they had recently received promotional texts.<\/p>\n
Founded in 2017 by childhood friends Peter Phillips and Teddy Gailas, Chip City built its following around hefty cookies and a rotating menu spanning more than 180 flavors. In 2022, Enlightened Hospitality Investments, the growth equity firm linked to restaurateur Danny Meyer, invested $10 million to fuel its expansion.<\/p>\n
As recently as July, the company reported 39 locations across six states and announced Baizan\u2019s promotion with talk of its \u201cnext phase of growth.\u201d By Thursday\u2019s employee email, that footprint had shrunk to 22.<\/p>\n
The closure also came days after Phillips, the former CEO, filed a lawsuit on September 28 alleging that Chip City had failed to pay severance owed after he stepped down in March. The suit also names the investment firm and company executives. That dispute is separate from the company\u2019s stated explanation for closing; the supplied reporting does not establish that it caused the shutdown.<\/p>\n
So, is there a comeback baking? Baizan said the company was \u201cstill sorting out next steps,\u201d but employees were explicitly told the closures were permanent. For now, New Yorkers will have to find their oversized-cookie fix elsewhere.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"One minute, Chip City was hyping an apple fritter cookie. The next, the whole operation had crumbled. The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":365291,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[39],"tags":[2590,9,24,2591,63,821,134,136,135],"class_list":["post-365290","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-staten-island","tag-categories-restaurants","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-news-eating","tag-nyc","tag-restaurants","tag-staten-island","tag-staten-island-headlines","tag-staten-island-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/365290","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=365290"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/365290\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/365291"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=365290"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=365290"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=365290"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}