Chip City recently opened locations in Miami Beach, Florida, and Fairfield, Connecticut, and is rapidly expanding to new cities.
The cookie chain, known for its unique and seasonal flavors from peanut butter and jelly to pumpkin spice latte, was founded in 2017 by Peter Phillips and Teddy Gailas.
The founders had humble expectations for the business. "Our original business plan was to sell 100 cookies a day," CEO Phillips told The Food Institute. "We got some good press, and things really took off from there."
Then in 2022, Shake Shack founder Danny Meyer and his investment firm, Enlightened Hospitality Investments, poured $10 million in Chip City to help the company open more locations. "At EHI, we are always looking for businesses that have created craveable products and have earned a tribe-like following," Meyer said in a press release.
Chip City currently has 23 locations, and Phillips told Nation's Restaurant News that the company plans to have 40 locations by the end of the year. Most of the chain's locations are in the tristate area, with 14 stores in three boroughs of New York City, four stores on Long Island, three stores in New Jersey, and one store in Connecticut.
Chip is using a similar business approach to cookie franchise Crumbl by planting stores in the right locations, offering novelty flavors on rotation, and drumming up excitement on social media. Crumbl is much larger in comparison, with 800 store locations, though Chip is showing that perhaps slow and steady wins the race.
I visited the Astoria, Queens, flagship store to see why the cookie chain is so popular. Full disclosure: I live in the neighborhood, so it wasn't my first time.