TRENDING
Anatomy
OF A POP-UP
HOW THE CHEF AT THE FOUR SEASONS HOTEL IN PHILADELPHIA TOOK HIS CONCEPT AND TEAM ON THE ROAD TO BUILD AWARENESS , COMRADERY , AND BENEFIT THE COMMUNITY .
By JEFF WEINSTEIN , EDITOR IN CHIEF
The five-item menu for the Down the Shore pop-up
The devil is in the details , and that couldn ’ t be truer for hotel restaurant operators who take their teams off-campus to create a week-long pop-up event . Vernick Fish , a contemporary American oyster bar located at Four Seasons Hotel Philadelphia at Comcast Center , brought the nearby New Jersey shore a taste of the celebrated restaurant when James Beard Award-winning Chef Greg Vernick and his team hosted in August an experiential five-day culinary activation and a collaborative fundraising dinner . The event , Vernick Fish Down the Shore , was done in partnership with Cookie Till , owner of Steve & Cookie ’ s , a beloved New Jersey bayside restaurant in Margate , where Chef Vernick spent much time as a youth and budding culinarian . “ I ’ ve been visiting Margate since I was a child and much of the menu for Vernick Fish was inspired by my time spent in this corner of the world - it ’ s even where I got my first kitchen job ,” Chef Vernick says . “ It felt like a full-circle moment for me to be able to present what we do at the restaurant at Steve & Cookie ’ s , a restaurant I ’ ve long-admired .”
Through strategic alliances with other merchants , including vendors Giordano ’ s and Samuels & Sons , some of the region ’ s top brands came together to create the ultimate culinary experience . On Monday through Friday of that week , the hotel team executed the pop-up experience at Steve & Cookie ’ s . They created a custombuilt space and presented a menu with five options . More than 1,000 customers were served , and the menu sold out daily . It also marketed branded merchandise like koozies , hats , t-shirts , etc . No tickets were sold ; it was simply a walk-up event .
To culminate the week , Cookie ’ s Reed ’ s Organic Farm hosted a 60-seat , sold-out , US $ 1,000-a-ticket benefit dinner with proceeds from both events going towards the farm .
The details for the benefit – from custom , branded wooden herb boxes that became the centerpiece for the dinner that guests took home with them , to the ambiance that was created through a live musical performance , the entire night felt like a scene from a movie . “ Preparing the perfect summer menu and seeing it come to life through the ingredients of our partners like Reed ’ s Organic Farm , Samuels & Sons Seafood and Giordano ’ s felt like the ultimate trifecta ,” Chef Vernick adds .
On top of that , the guests were overwhelmingly generous in donating to the farm ’ s non-profit , A Meaningful Purpose , which supports the growth of the local community through agriculture and allows collaborations like this to take place .
But the event wouldn ’ t have come off so seamlessly without a lot of planning .
For example , it became clear that to maintain the integrity and freshness of Vernick Fish ’ s ingredients , the team would need proper refrigeration . They were able to prep and store some items at Steve & Cookie ’ s but with it being one of the busiest restaurants at the Jersey shore , the hotel team wanted to be mindful to not interrupt their service too much . Thankfully , it had partners like Giordano ’ s Garden Groceries who lent them a refrigerated truck to store a few items on-site and pick up what they needed before making the onehour trip from Philadelphia to Margate each day .
Chef Vernick also had to come up with a staffing schedule back
38 hotelsmag . com Nov / Dec 2022