Penn Sta. Pret preps for beer & wine bar
Pret A Manger’s soon-to-open Penn Station eatery will have a full-service 12-seat U-shaped beer and wine bar, The Post has learned.
The bar concept, tested for years in London, is the first of its kind for Pret in the US.
It will feature beer in bottles and on tap and wine from California, Italy and New Zealand, the company said.
The Penn Station location — at 5,968 square feet, twice as big at its standard location — will also feature communal tables as well as high-top cocktail seating.
“Our baristas make thousands of coffees every day for our customers, so we thought, why not offer beer and wine, too,” said Joanne Brett, president of the company’s operations in the US, where it has 76 eateries in New York, Boston, Washington, DC and Chicago.
By adding alcohol to its menu, Pret joins a handful of other quick-service eateries — Shake Shack and Chipotle, for example — plus fast-food spin-off BK Whopper Bar in Miami.
If the Penn Station bar concept is a hit, Pret may expand it to other US locations, Brett told The Post.
Earlier this year, Starbucks ended its year-old beer and wine program in more than 400 stores — but may add alcohol to the menu at its upscale Roastery stores, according to several reports.
At the Penn Station Pret, customers will have to purchase their food separately and bring it to the bar, a Pret spokeswoman said.
With 450 eateries worldwide, privately owned Pret is opening another 12 stores in the US this year, compared with nine new stores last year, the spokeswoman said.