Article By Roast Magazine
Ralph Lauren has created its own brand of coffee, Ralph’s Coffee, highlighted by a swanky coffee shop on the second floor of its new flagship New York store.
Considered as a lifestyle product, coffee has been increasingly infiltrating the fashion world, but this is the first time we’ve seen a fashion brand unveil a coffee line under its own name. To be clear, Ralph’s Coffee is actually being brewed and packaged by Philadelphia-based La Colombe, but the Ralph’s branding extends throughout the shop, to a vintage mobile truck, and even to clothing items and accessories.
The company has shared little about the Ralph’s Coffee concept, outside of a few details through its social media channels, but the coffee shop — upstairs at 711 Fifth Avenue — is now fully operational with a menu of coffees, espresso drinks, teas, bottled beverages and packaged pastries and sandwiches. Tins of whole bean Ralph’s Coffee are also available for sale.
“The smell of freshly brewed coffee evokes so many memories for me, mostly of time spent with friends and family, the people I love,” Ralph Lauren (the man) says on the company’s website. “I wanted to develop these coffee blends in that spirit, and create a place where people could come together and take a break from their busy days.”
Set apart from the main clothing retail area, Ralph’s Coffee shop features white-tiled floors, white bead-board walls, 18-foot oak columns and marble-top tables with antique bistro chairs.