Chicago — Cornerstone Restaurant Group (CRG), a national leader in the restaurant space, looks beyond traditional borders in restaurant dining to where the customer is consuming today. Widely considered a trailblazer in the delivery space in Chicago, CRG is embracing new opportunities and new technologies in the months ahead. Led by freshly minted President Josh Zadikoff, CRG is pleased to announce exciting initiatives this summer, from a virtual restaurant space to retail dining to food halls.
CRG has partnered with global home furnishings retailer, Crate & Barrel, to open its first full-service restaurant, The Table at Crate, featuring CRG partner, Chef Bill Kim. The new restaurant will be located at one of Crate & Barrel’s largest stores in Oak Brook, Ill., and is planned to open this July. The restaurant will feature indoor and outdoor seating on two levels and over 100 seats. Unique features will include social and shopping integrations, beyond what restaurants have offered before, as well as fun aspects like a shopping bag valet in restaurant.
In addition, CRG embraced a new virtual restaurant space, Kitchen United, to expand the delivery footprint of its urbanbelly brand. The Los Angeles-based virtual restaurant provider opened its second location in Chicago earlier this year. Kitchen United’s “kitchen centers” are facilities that can house 10-20 restaurants with commercial kitchens optimized specifically for the catering, delivery and takeout marketplace — offering CRG a value-driven, low-risk opportunity to expand its delivery range and reach more customers faster. With this move, the brand expanded to Chicago’s River North and Streeterville neighborhoods.
Chef Bill Kim was recently announced as an incoming chef at the first Time Out Market in Chicago. The 50,000-square-foot, three-level Chicago food hall will feature 18 restaurants, three bars and a demo kitchen.
Additionally, May wrapped up urbanbelly’s 3-month-long pop-up at the popular lunch destination, Revival Food Hall. As one the first and most popular food halls in Chicago, urbanbelly was much loved by the Loop workers and residents, providing a successful run for CRG and expanding delivery further by offering a new pick-up location those three months.
A large piece of CRG is its growing ventures with Jump Higher, overseeing all of the Michael Jordan-brand restaurants. The group is currently planning an international expansion to the Asian market, targeting opening the first Michael Jordan’s Steak House in Asia.
Another concept within the Jordan-brand restaurants is SolToro, a Mexican restaurant located in Uncasville, Conn. SolToro is a brand that allows for flexibility — any additional locations of the restaurant have the choice for it to be a fast-casual taco bar or a full-service restaurant, depending on which the operators believe will be more popular with the guests of that market. Cornerstone is actively seeking development partners outside of the Connecticut area to expand the brand to new markets.
Cornerstone Restaurant Group and affiliate Jump Higher, L.L.C., led by restaurateurs David Zadikoff and Josh Zadikoff, in partnership with Michael Jordan, oversee all Michael Jordan-brand restaurants. Additionally, Cornerstone’s growing Asian ventures with Chef Bill Kim include urbanbelly in Chicago’s Wicker Park neighborhood, with plans for more to come. In 2019, Cornerstone will partner with retailer Crate & Barrel to open a full-service restaurant in its Oakbrook Center location, with Kim leading the menu development. Cornerstone also manages operations for ENO Wine Room (Chicago, San Francisco). For more information, visit www.cornerstonerestaurants.com.
SOURCE: Cornerstone Restaurant Group